I Can Never Go Home
by fanspired
Summary: After the Demon attacks the Winchesters, Sam Campbell must protect and prepare John's shell-shocked son. When a couple disappear on a lonely Californian road it provides an opportunity to initiate Dean into the dark mysteries of the Supernatural. (This story is now available in Russian translation. Please google the very talented "yelynx" at "livejournal" for details.)
1. What's Wrong With This Picture?

AUTHOR'S NOTES: This is the pilot of a serialized story, written in the episodic style of the original show. PLEASE NOTE there is an ongoing slash romance sub-plot, but this only manifests as UST nuances in the early episodes.

DISCLAIMER: I'd like to acknowledge/apologize to the creators and writers of Supernatural for all original dialogue lovingly pinched and abused for the purposes of this fic.

* * *

><p>Chapter 1: What's Wrong With This Picture?<p>

_Attempting to escape from his violent past and the demands of his hunter family, Sam is struggling to make a life for himself in a new town when a death vision of his employer's wife and son, under horribly familiar circumstances, draws him back into old ways and the hunt for his mother's killer._

The house was unexceptional. It could have been one of a million homes in America's heartland, and there was absolutely nothing about its features that made them memorable. Once viewed, its details would slip from the mind as easily as the remnants of a fading dream. The young man who was ascending the stairs clutching a sandwich was another matter. Tall, lean-muscled, with a mop of carefully blow-waved chestnut hair and a manner of studied ease, he could have been a male model. But it was only when you studied his face close up that you appreciated how extraordinarily beautiful he was. His boyish features had an almost feminine sensuality; his large liquid-bright eyes sparkled with iridescent green-hazel hues and were framed by a thick fringe of astonishingly long lashes, and his mouth . . . his mouth . . . his full, silk-soft, sensuous lips had a compelling fascination – they made you want to touch, want to kiss, to taste . . .

He was raising the sandwich to his mouth as he reached a bedroom door. Pausing before opening it he glanced down the hall to the room at the end of the passage where light streamed through a partially open door.

"Night, Mom!" he called.

He took a bite of his sandwich and turned the handle of his own door, then paused again. "Mom?" he called again through half chewed bread. Some instinct, some sense of unease, drew him down the passage toward the open door.

"Mom?" he repeated, a little louder, a little more insistently.

The room appeared empty when he entered it and a puzzled frown settled on his face. Then something bright red splashed on his forehead.

_No._

He wiped the drip from his brow and stared for a moment at the blood red stain on his fingers.

_Don't look up._

His bright eyes flicked to the ceiling. There was a moment of dull incomprehension before they widened with horror and he uttered a strangled scream. "Mom!"

There was the briefest glimpse of the blood-soaked woman pinned to the ceiling before a wash of yellow flames blazed from the centre, engulfing her.

_NO!_

Yellow light enflamed the emerald hues in his frozen, stricken eyes before the room exploded around him and he was swallowed by the mass of greedy fire.

...

"DHUU!" Sam woke up flailing and panting. His heartbeat was racing and his temples throbbed with a searing headache; he was forced to close his eyes from the piercing glare of the morning light. He lay crouched and still, fighting waves of nausea for a full two minutes before the pain began to recede and, even then, his respiration and heart-rate were far from steady. It had been so vivid.

He'd had nightmares many times before. Since his childhood his dreams had been haunted by death and violence, that was nothing new; it was to be expected, he supposed. But these new dreams, the ones peopled by strangers and strange places, the ones accompanied by sick pain and a horrible, helpless sense of foreboding, they were different. And now this.

The manner of the woman's death was familiar, too familiar, of course. He might have been able to pass off the dream as the product of latent memory and anxiety if it weren't for the headache . . . and the young man. Sam had never seen him before, he was sure of that, yet every minute detail of the man's features was still startlingly present to his mind's eye even now that the dream itself was fading. And Sam couldn't explain the acute distress he'd felt at the moment he'd watched this stranger die. He had felt it as if it were a deep personal loss. _Why?_

Slowly and cautiously, still fighting the urge to retch, Sam uncurled his body from its fetal coil then unzipped and extricated himself from the twisted folds of his sleeping bag. Making up a fire he started to prepare some breakfast, and all the while he cooked and ate a gnawing ache gripped his chest. He couldn't understand it, but he couldn't lose the feeling that what he'd seen had been real, that the stranger was real . . . that, somewhere in the world, the young man really existed - or had existed. As the last thought occurred to him Sam felt a stabbing pang of something like grief.

It made no sense.

With breakfast finished he bathed in the chill shallows of the lake then returned shivering to the camp fire. The clothes he'd washed and hung from the branch of a tree the previous evening were still slightly damp. As autumn progressed it would be harder to get clothes dry, but he hoped to save up enough money for the deposit on a place of some sort soon. After he'd toweled himself down and changed into his dry clothes, he took down the damp ones and rolled them in his spare towel before storing them in his back pack. Another minute saw his few other possessions safely stowed and the fire doused. Before he broke camp he performed his habitual checks - gun, holy water, silver knife, iron bar, stake . . . – before hoisting the pack onto his shoulders. It was heavier than it looked, but Sam was used to its weight. He had a long walk to work, but he was getting used to that, too.

...

Winchester and Copes Auto was on the outskirts of town. Sam acknowledged he'd been very fortunate to find a place with John and Stan. When he'd seen the advertisement for an assistant mechanic he'd walked in all prepared with his fake references, fake IDs and social, but one look at John's face and something had prompted Sam to abandon all pretence. He'd told the truth – or as much of it as he reasonably could – that he'd been brought up on the move, he'd never held a steady job but he had a number of useful skills, that he'd kept some questionable company in the past and had done some things he regretted, but he was honest (in his own way) and ready to work hard if Winchester were only prepared to give him a chance to make a fresh start.

Sam had found John instantly likeable. He was an earthy, no nonsense, practical man with shrewd eyes and a warm smile. He'd watched Sam clean a carburetor then he'd given him the job. And Sam had worked hard since then to repay the man's generosity and prove himself worthy of the opportunity he'd been given. Stan Copes, John's business partner, had been rather less accepting of Sam at first. His small-town suspicion of strangers had made him wary of the newcomer and he'd watched Sam with eagle-eyed vigilance while John had gradually given the boy greater responsibility as he demonstrated himself capable, and eventually Stan had come around and welcomed Sam as one of the team. Today, however, he was working on an engine by himself while Stan and John were doing a rush job for a regular customer. Mid afternoon John appeared by his side oil-stained and sweaty but looking satisfied. Sam inferred the job was completed successfully.

"Haven't had a chance to check up on you today, Sam. Have you eaten yet? I'll bet you haven't."

Sam smiled without comment. He was sure John hadn't taken any lunch yet either.

"Come on, take a break, son. You work like a machine."

Sam followed John to the kitchen where Stan was already making coffee for the three of them. He fetched his roll and juice from the refrigerator and ate quietly while the two men discussed their plans for Thanksgiving. Stan was excited because he was planning a big family trip to Disneyland. John was expecting his son home from college and was looking forward to seeing him. Apparently he was bringing his girlfriend to meet the folks for the first time and John ventured the opinion that Dean might be serious about this one. He expressed the hope that she might be a steadying influence on the boy. John always spoke fondly and proudly of Dean, but Sam sensed he was worried about his son for some reason. Sam wasn't good at making conversation so he just ate and read the day's news. A few pages in, toward the bottom of the page, a small item snatched Sam's attention. His eyes widened. By itself it might mean nothing, but coming on top of the dream . . .

"What are your plans for Thanksgiving, Sam?" Stan asked.

"Oh . . . I'm planning to go visit some friends upstate."

John gave Sam a searching look. He knew Sam was lying and it made Sam feel bad, but John was the kind of man who'd invite Sam to stay with his family for the holiday if he found out Sam was going to be spending it alone, and he didn't want to intrude.

"Where do your friends live?"

Panicking a little, Sam turned the paper around so the other two could see it. "Did you see this?" he asked. "About the dead cattle? Nobody seems to know what caused it."

John nodded. "Bad business. Jack's insured but the insurance companies never pay what these beasts are worth. It's gonna cost Jack and he can't afford to be out of pocket in this climate."

"Where's Jack's farm?"

"Over at Weatherall"

Sam hesitated. It was an awkward disconnected question, but he had to know. "Have there been any house fires in the area recently?"

John and Stan checked each other for confirmation but returned nothing but a shrug and a puzzled frown. "Not that we've heard of. Why do you ask?"

"Oh I just thought . . ." Sam thought fast. "I think I heard there was a study . . . some connection between house fires and cattle deaths . . . I don't remember the details."

Stan laughed. "Think you must've dreamt that one, kid. Mind you, seems like they'll do a study about anything these days."

Sam put down the newspaper. "I'd better get back to work."

"Hang on, Sam." John pushed his lunchbox toward the young man. Half of a thick chicken salad sandwich remained in the box. "Do me a favour and finish this off for me, would you? Amanda always makes too much but she'll give me hell if I waste it."

Sam knew what John was doing but he wasn't about to refuse. John's wife's sandwiches were always delicious. "Sure, John, thanks." Sam gratefully picked up the wedge. His mouth was already awash with saliva before he took the first bite. Mmm. Home cooked chicken, real home-made mayo. His stomach growled, impatient for him to finish chewing.

The dream, the vision of the young man, hovered uneasily before his mind's eye for the rest of the afternoon. He couldn't stop thinking about it, and as soon as the working day was over he headed out toward Weatherall. Conducting investigations on foot was tiring and time consuming so when John drew up beside him in the Impala on the way out of town and asked if he could give him a lift somewhere Sam was tempted to accept, but it would have invited too many questions.

"Thanks, John, but I'm fine. I enjoy walking; I like the exercise."

John's gaze flickered to the pack on Sam's back and back to his face but he let it drop, returning instead to the subject of Thanksgiving. "You know, I meant what I said earlier, about you joining us," he insisted. "It would be good for you to meet Dean. He could show you around the area, introduce you to some of his friends in town. Wouldn't you like to meet some young people your own age?"

"Yeah . . . yeah, I would . . ." Sam replied awkwardly. He was less convinced than John seemed to be that his son and his girlfriend would enjoy having a third wheel tagging around with them. "But my friends upstate are expecting me so . . ."

John regarded him evenly. "Well, if your plans fall through, you'll let me know, won't you? You'd be more than welcome, Sam. I mean it." John smiled warmly. "See you tomorrow." As Sam watched the Impala drive away a slight crease furrowed the flesh between his eyebrows and an odd, vague ache settled in his chest. He wondered what it felt like to truly feel _welcome _somewhere.

…

None of the buildings around Weatherall looked familiar but it was hard to be sure since he hadn't seen the house from the outside. He established the site of the cattle deaths from a local and took the opportunity to ask about the young man at the same time, but the man didn't recognize him from Sam's description. "How about in town?" Sam persisted. "He'd stand out. He's . . . like a TV star or something."

"Which one?"

Sam was momentarily derailed. "I mean he's good looking," he elaborated. "I mean . . . _really_ good looking."

The man regarded him impassively for several moments before responding with a voice that dripped sarcasm. "I wouldn't know," he drawled unpleasantly. "I don't go around noticing if young men are good looking."

Sam felt the heat of a blush beginning to tinge his cheeks and he disengaged himself from the conversation as quickly as he could. His investigation of the fateful pasture was more conclusive but less than reassuring. His first sweep of the field turned up a residue of yellow powder, and a quick sniff of the acrid substance confirmed it was sulphur.

Sam's anxiety was tempered by a strange, dark emotion that was almost like eagerness. Finally, after all these years, Sam had found the demon. It was _here_.

. . .

His initial excitement soon dissipated into fretfulness and frustration. The day's discoveries had filled him with ambivalence. There was, as yet, nothing to suggest that the fire had already occurred, which led him to hope that it might still be prevented. Surely, after all, he wouldn't have been granted the vision if it were not in his power to stop it being fulfilled? But the discovery of the sulphur made the threat more immediate and he was no closer to knowing where the house was, or who the would-be victims were. He felt he was running out of time and he had no clue where to search next.

The sun was setting over the lake as he finished washing the previous day's clothes and settled down in front of the fire. He'd found the remains of a Snickers bar in his back-pack and that had been his dinner since he'd left it too late to visit a store, and it had only served to awaken rather than satisfy his appetite. More to take his mind off his hunger than anything else he took out a pad of paper and tried to sketch whatever he could remember of the interior of the house. It didn't amount to much: a couple of bog standard doors; maybe a picture on a wall, the details of which escaped him. In the end, it was only the young man that he could visualize with any degree of accuracy. He began a detailed portrait that he was still working on assiduously as twilight closed around his camp, and when darkness descended he continued to sketch by torchlight.

His pencil was lightly brushing the outline of the man's lips when his attention was caught by the sound of a motor in the distance. As the car drew nearer Sam was picked out in its headlights and he realized he'd camped too close to the road. He wasn't too concerned until he heard the engine slow, but as the wheels crunched on the gravel at the verge a short distance away Sam put the sketch pad away in his back-pack, and his hand automatically reached for and cradled the gun in the inside pocket.

The base beat of some rock track could be heard thumping from the car's interior, and as a door opened the strains of AC/DC assaulted the clear night air. Sam's grip on the gun loosened slightly. He was familiar with the number; he had heard it playing at the auto shop many times in the last month. A moment later the sound of John's voice simultaneously quelled his fears yet filled him with a different kind of anxiety.

"Sam! Sam, is that you?"

_Oh, crap._

A torch light shone on Sam's face and he could just make out John's silhouette behind it before the beam swung away and began picking out in turn the bare accoutrements of Sam's life that were organised around the fire. John's imposing figure took form as he stepped within the circle of the firelight. He wore an expression that compounded amusement, exasperation and understanding. "Dammit, Sam! Have you been sleeping rough out here all this time?" Before Sam could frame an answer he continued in an authoritative tone. "Pack up your things and douse the fire, Sam. You're coming home with me. There's a storm coming up from the south. You'll get drenched if you stay here."

Sam tried to marshal an argument. "No, really, John. I'm fine. I have a tarp. I'll be – "

"I said pack up your things, son!" John had already picked up Sam's backpack (an action that automatically raised Sam's hackles) and was marching back to the car with it. Sam stood for a moment with his jaw clenched and his nostrils flaring with conflicted feelings. He appreciated that John was acting out of kindness; still he resented being ordered around. John's tone reminded him too much of his grandfather. On the other hand, he realized that forcing a confrontation with his employer at this time would be shooting himself in the foot and, truthfully, he really would rather not sleep out in a storm. He stood irresolute for only a moment longer before shelving his pride and taking John's lead. He doused the fire, packed up his bedroll, gathered his remaining things and followed the older man back to the Impala.

The volume of the stereo assaulted his ears as he slipped into the passenger seat. John liked his music loud, and Sam was forced to raise his voice to be heard above it. "This is really too kind of you, John," he complained.

John smiled broadly. "It's just until you find your own place, Sam. Amanda and I have the room with Dean at college right now. You might as well have the benefit of it."

Sam could only mutter his thanks and he settled back for the journey. The volume of the music irritated him but, on the plus side, it eliminated the need for conversation and Sam was content to listen to John singing along in a pleasing baritone. When at length they drew up outside John's modest home on the outskirts of the town he parked the car and turned toward Sam. Fishing inside his jacket he pulled out his wallet and took a wad of notes from it.

Sam's eyes widened with alarm. "Oh, John, no, no!" he objected, but John just grabbed his arm and slapped the bundle into his hand. "It's an advance on your wages," he insisted, and it was hard to argue with the man when his earnest intense gaze was fixed on Sam's face. "Don't go hungry for the sake of your pride, son. It isn't worth it." He held Sam's hand gripped in his strong fist for a moment longer, and Sam swallowed as he fought to contain unfamiliar emotions that were threatening to overcome him. Then John slapped his shoulder. "Come in and meet the wife," he said.

Amanda was an attractive woman as warm, friendly and disarming as her husband. She looked vaguely familiar, perhaps because she bore more than a passing resemblance to pictures he'd seen of his own mother, and Sam warmed to her as quickly as he had to John. It appeared that John had spoken of him, and she welcomed Sam as a friend and quickly sat him down to join their evening meal. When she placed a large plate of home-made stew in front of him Sam could have kissed her.

Unlike John, however, she was less careful of Sam's privacy. She was naturally curious of his background and, initially, asked questions he realized he should have prepared answers for. It didn't take her long to discover that Sam was an orphan that his single mother had died when he was an infant, and that he'd been raised by his grandfather. When the nomadic nature of his upbringing came out she asked, with unaffected interest, "Oh, are you Romany?"

A slightly confused furrow appeared between Sam's eyebrows. "Um – "

"You were born in Lawrence, you say?" John interrupted.

"Yessir."

"I met a Samuel Campbell there once. Any relation?"

Sam hesitated. He was reluctant to acknowledge the man he was named for . . . if John _knew_ him . . . "Ah, yes. Distant, I think. I don't know that side of the family well." After a moment he added. "How did you know him?"

"I was there on business years ago." John responded. "We nodded to each other one time." After that he turned the conversation toward work matters and plans for Thanksgiving and, for the first time, it occurred to Sam that John was the one who was now being evasive. Funny, how knowing the Campbells would do that to a person.

But the uncomfortable moment passed as the meal progressed. Amanda pressed on Sam another helping of stew followed by two more than ample helpings of apple pie. It was more than Sam was used to eating, perhaps more than he'd ever eaten at one sitting, but he wasn't going to complain. John broke out a couple of beers and Sam actually started to relax. He was feeling something close to contentment, yet it was tinged with a pang of melancholy at the knowledge that it could only ever be temporary. John and Amanda were a window onto a world where he knew in his soul he would never truly belong. He wondered if the enigmatic Dean Winchester knew how lucky he was. Probably not. People seldom appreciated what they had.

When, at length, John suggested they turn in, Sam welcomed it. He was tired and the excess of food and comfort had made him sleepy. Amanda fetched clean towels from the laundry and he followed her to the upstairs landing where she showed him the room he was to sleep in and bade him goodnight.

Sam felt a rush of warmth toward her, and not just because she reminded him so much of the mother he'd never known. "Mrs. Winchester, thank you so much for your hospitality and kindness. I can't tell you how much I appreciate it."

"It's Amanda," she corrected, gracing Sam with a warm generous smile, her large green eyes sparkling. "And you've very welcome."

As she turned and walked toward her own room Sam was filled with an uneasy sense of déjà vu. He was suddenly convinced that she was familiar to him for more than her passing resemblance to old photographs. As she opened her bedroom door and entered the light from within illuminated the corridor and picked out a picture on the wall. Recognition came like a blow to the gut. It simultaneously filled Sam with the need to cry out and robbed him of the power to do so. He stood frozen, wanting to run after her, not knowing what he could possibly say.

_Mrs. Winchester – Amanda – you're in danger! A yellow-eyed demon is planning to kill you and your son!_

She'd think he was insane.

Sam could now hear casual conversation being exchanged between John and Amanda as they prepared for bed. It calmed his helpless anxiety a little and he started to reason with himself. Dean wasn't due back from college for weeks yet, and that surely meant there was no imminent danger. Assuming events happened the way they appeared in his dream he had time to find a way to protect them both . . . Assuming that.

Sam's fingers were trembling as he reached for the door handle and stepped inside the room he now knew to belong to the young man of his vision. He turned on the light and swept his gaze around the room, trying to glean from it some impression of the familiar stranger. It was disconcertingly commonplace, like the room of any young American student. Posters on the walls depicted an eclectic musical taste, from Metallica to Bon Jovi to the Scissor Sisters; lining one wall was an impressive array of sound and musical equipment and speakers, and there were a couple of guitars in one corner. In another corner there was a students' desk and, above it, a stack of shelves that contained a puzzling mixture of text books on law, business studies and music theory. The space on the desk was taken up with an old computer, CDs and more sound equipment and, next to it, a number of large breasted, partially clad ladies pouted at Sam from the pages of a wall calendar. Nearer the bed was another book shelf filled with cheap novels, mostly pulp fiction - some horror fantasy, Sam noted – and, perhaps more surprisingly, some romantic fiction. There were also some DVDs: mainly action movies, some old classics and . . . Sam picked one out and studied the cover; _The Lake House_? . . . and a box set of some TV show called _The Gilmore Girls_.

Apart from the space filled by a small clock radio, the entire bedside table was devoted to family photographs and there, right at the front, was Dean himself standing arm in arm with his father, grinning broadly, dressed in fishing gear and holding up a large salmon. He was windswept and looking more rugged than he had in the dream but it was unmistakably the same young man: same chestnut hair now tangled and flying about in the wind, same boyish face, same full lips, same luminous green orbs. As Sam stared at the photo his stomach began to ferment with a turbulent brew of emotions, then a bright blue-white light illuminated the room startling him with a violence that shook him right back to the moment and its pressing threat. He crossed to the window where, on the horizon, he could see the bright glare of the approaching storm then a sharp, jagged fork of lightning. Moments later a shuddering bang rocked Sam's body before settling into an ominous rumble. He _didn't _have weeks. Whatever the details of his dream suggested to the contrary, it was clear to him: the demon was here now.

But Sam's investigation of the room had given him time to steady his racing mind and start thinking of some practical measures he could take. He dropped his backpack on the bed, took out the holy water and, as an extra precaution, slid his gun into the waistband at the back of his jeans. Slipping off his shoes he crossed to the door and silently opened it, listened for a minute or so to satisfy himself John and Amanda were now safely settled in bed, then he stepped into the corridor and unstoppered the bottle. Murmuring the words of the incantation as quietly as he could he quickly traced the protective symbol of the triquetra, first on Dean's door then on Amanda's, before slipping downstairs to the kitchen. Lightning and thunder continued to alternate as he searched the cupboards and found a large carton of salt. Then his heart sank as the sound of heavy rain told him that it would be useless. A line of salt round the house would be washed away immediately, and lining the doors and windows of somebody else's home was impracticable.

As Sam stood pondering the alternatives he was suddenly riven by the simultaneous assault of blinding light and ear-splitting bang. The storm was now directly overhead. Then, as he tried to steady his racing heartbeat after the shock of the thunderclap, he heard a noise in the next room – a loud bump followed by restrained muttering – and his adrenaline levels spiked. Moving swiftly to the doorway he flattened himself against the wall and unstoppered the holy water once more. A quick glance into the next room revealed a male figure silhouetted against a flash of lightning, about John's height but not as broad, and heading Sam's way. Sam blew out a quick breath to calm himself then, before the intruder reached the kitchen, he stepped out in front of him and threw the holy water into his face.

The only response was a startled "What the fuck - ?" and that coupled with the ease with which Sam swept him to the floor reassured him that his quarry was human after all, and not much of a threat either, perhaps nothing more sinister than some junkie robbing the place to score drug money.

Sam pulled out his gun and leveled it at the man's head. "When I tell you to," he breathed menacingly, "you're going to get up very slowly and keep your hands where I can see them." Sam had only raised the gun for effect. He hadn't even bothered releasing the safety, and that was just as well since his prisoner's response was to make an ill-advised grab for the gun that might well have resulted in it going off in his face if it had been primed. Then he started screaming, and as Sam began to absorb the words he was yelling he started to get the first tiny, uneasy inkling of a suspicion that he might just have screwed the pooch.

"Dad! Dad! We've got burglars, Dad! Can you hear me? DAD!"

_Oh crap! Crap crap crap crap crap CRAP!_

Sam hastily replaced the gun in his belt and moved to restrain the young man's arms that were now flailing and punching wildly. He was panicking and unpredictable and Sam was loath to let him up until he could calm him down, but that wasn't an easy task.

"Ssh! Calm down. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to – I thought – calm down – just calm down – I'm not gonna hurt you!"

Suddenly the light was on and Sam's heart slammed into the wall of his chest with a force that expelled all the air from his lungs. He was staring straight down into the face of the vision, straight into those wide, bright emerald eyes. And they were angry.

.


	2. I Am the Tune Play Me Part 1

Chapter 2: I Am the Tune. Play Me. (Part 1)

_Sam's desire to protect John's family is complicated by his growing fascination with John's irritating but charismatic son. WARNING: WINCEST SLASH FICTION!_

. . .

"Dad! I've caught a burglar!"

The audacity of the claim startled Sam. John, on the other hand, seemed more amused than surprised. "From where I'm standing it looks more like he's caught you, Dean," he drawled sardonically.

Sam immediately jumped to his feet and Dean scrambled up after him. "John — I 'm sorry, sir," Sam stammered. "I didn't realize — I thought he was an intruder. I thought — didn't you say you weren't expecting Dean back yet?"

"I wasn't," John agreed, giving Dean a sharply enquiring look.

"Dad, he's got a gun!" Dean interrupted.

John's sharp gaze switched immediately to Sam, and Sam thought at that moment he'd rather be facing a wendigo. John stretched out his arm. "Hand it over, Sam," he demanded, coolly.

Sam felt his jaw tightening but he didn't argue. He was in John's home, and he'd just attacked John's son. He wasn't in a position to debate the issue. Retrieving the pistol from his waistband, he double checked the safety and placed it in his employer's hand. John swiftly emptied the magazine and stowed the gun in a drawer behind him.

"You can have it back tomorrow, Sam," John said, "But I want it out of the house first thing. Find somewhere else to keep it. I won't have firearms in my home."

"Yessir," Sam responded, but with a revealing sideways jerk of his jaw that told his discomfort. He felt like a naughty schoolboy who'd had a toy confiscated, but being deprived of the weapon made his gut boil with anxiety. If John only knew all the monsters that waited out in the darkness to threaten his home and his family he'd have every room loaded with more weapons than he could imagine.

"So you two know each other, then?" Dean finally interjected, eyeing Sam charily.

"Sam's been working with us out at the lot," John explained. "He's staying here until he finds a place of his own."

Dean's lips parted and his eyes widened with shock. "You rented out my room?" It struck Sam that he had rather the tone and appearance of a wounded puppy.

"Sam's here as our guest," John corrected. "And, last I knew, _you_weren't coming back 'til Thanksgiving."

"What are you doing home, Dean?" asked Amanda who had appeared quietly at her husband's side during the course of the conversation. She looked concerned.

The moments that followed the question were silent but for the continuing rumble of thunder outside the house. "It's a long story, Mom," Dean eventually replied.

"You've been suspended again," said John, coolly. It was a statement.

A beat, then Dean hitched an unnaturally broad grin onto his face. "Apparently not _that_long."

From John's expression it looked like Dean's false cheeriness had the effect of a cattle prod on him and it was only Amanda's intervention that forestalled an explosion. "Not now, John!" she said warningly. "Sam doesn't want to listen to us bickering. Whatever you've got to say can wait until morning." She stepped forward and slipped a hand round Dean's neck, combing his hair off his face with the other. "You need to get out of your wet things, Sweetheart. You're soaked through. Have you eaten? Do you want me to get you something?"

"Stop fussing over the boy, woman," John growled. "If he's hungry he knows where the kitchen is and I hope he's got brains enough to know for himself when he's wet."

Sam wanted nothing more than to be out of this uncomfortable situation so he started making his way to the stairs and mumbled something about getting his things out of Dean's room.

"No, you won't, Sam," John interrupted tersely. "You're in there, now. Dean can sleep on the couch tonight."

"No one has to sleep on the couch, John. I can make up the cot in the den — "

"You'll do no such thing, Amanda. Not tonight. It won't hurt Dean to spend one night on the couch. Now go back to bed. You, too, Sam. And _you_— " John pointed imperiously at his son, "we'll talk in the morning." With that he took Amanda by the shoulders and steered her protesting body firmly out of the room.

Sam's skin crawled with mortification and he felt unable to move. He wondered that he could stare into the face of a vampire without flinching yet this little domestic dispute was something he felt utterly unequipped to cope with. He heard Dean muttering angrily under his breath. Something about "twenty-six years old" and he started stripping off his shirt like Sam wasn't even in the room.

Sam cleared his throat and started babbling "You can have your room. I'll get my stuff out. It won't take a moment, really. It's no problem."

Dean laughed humourlessly. "Except if Dad gets up tomorrow and finds you on the couch instead of me then it'll be _my_problem. Don't worry about it, Sammy. You go on back to bed like Dad said."

Sam winced, but didn't blame Dean for the lingering anger and resentment he could hear in his tone. He couldn't imagine getting off to a start much worse than this with the man whose life he was supposed to be saving. He cleared his throat again but before he could say anything more Amanda was back carrying sheets and bedding.

"You'll be needing these," she said, handing Dean the covers. "Is there anything else I can get you?"

"I'll be fine, Mom. How do you think I manage at college?"

She laughed. "I can't imagine." She reached up and kissed his cheek. "I'm glad you're home. I've missed you, and so has your father even if he won't say so. Night, Sweetheart." As she turned to leave the room she smiled at Sam. "Are you ok, Sam?"

"Yes, thanks, Am — " Sam glanced at Dean "mm Mrs. Winchester." He winced again at the awkwardness of it all and Amanda gave him another sympathetic smile and was gone.

Dean was now pulling off his shoes and socks. "Hey, I hope one of us is planning to sleep in that bed tonight," he said pointedly.

Sam shook himself and tried to take charge of the situation. "Listen, I'm sorry about what happened, I didn't know — "

"What about? The whole nearly shooting me thing? Nah! That was a bit of excitement in my life. Like going to the movies. It's not every day I get a gun shoved in my face." Dean was wearing his razor blade grin again. "I think I may have peed myself a little." Sam recognized that this was a defensive gesture, something Dean did when he felt uncomfortable or intimidated, so he was surprised when Dean proceeded to unzip and strip off his pants right in front of Sam. He must have felt very confident that his semi-nudity would be more threatening to Sam than himself. And he may have been right; the sight of Dean standing brazenly in front of him clad in nothing but his boxers was starting to make Sam feel very uncomfortable.

"Look," Sam persisted. "I thought you were an intruder and — "

"You don't have to explain, Sammy," Dean interrupted, his tone still falsely cheery and with a deliberately needling edge to it. "I get it. I really do. And, it's been great chatting with you, but I have to make a phone call — "

"It's Sam!" He was immediately sorry that he'd allowed his irritation to show in his voice. For a moment he'd forgotten he was supposed to be building bridges here. "Sam Campbell," he added, trying to soften it, and he extended his hand. It was a make or break gesture and it would be hard to come back from if Dean rejected it.

The intense green eyes locked with his, studying and assessing him, and Sam realised that Dean had inherited something of his father's shrewdness. He hesitated for only a moment before reaching out and meeting Sam's handshake with his own firm, solid grip. The warmth of the contact sent an odd thrill through Sam's body, like an electric current, and he wished Dean wasn't quite so . . . naked. It just made the whole situation feel a little . . . unseemly. But Dean didn't appear to feel the inappropriateness of it. He actually seemed to have relaxed.

"It's good to meet you, Sam," he grinned, this time with a genuine chuckle. "Apart from, you know, the actual _meeting_."

Sam smiled uneasily.

"It's OK, Sam. We're good. I get it. You thought you were protecting the folks. And that's cool." He looked straight into Sam's face and was suddenly serious. "I appreciate it." Another beat and then he gave Sam's arm a friendly slap . . . then he squeezed his bicep. "Hm. Some serious muscle there, bro," he commented with a quick grin and a hitch of his eyebrows. Then he picked up a towel Amanda had brought in with the bedding and started rubbing himself down and, again, it was like Sam wasn't even there.

And Sam started to wonder why he was still there. He had nothing more to say. He should just . . . go. He should go now. OK he was going to go now. "I'm going to go now."

Dean looked up and gave him a slightly quizzical look. "OK."

Still Sam hesitated. "Are you sure you don't want your room back?"

"We had this conversation already." Dean was fishing in his rucksack now and he pulled out a cell phone.

"Yeah. OK."

Dean waited, and still Sam hadn't moved. "I have to make a call," he said significantly. "I promised my girlfriend I'd let her know I got home safe."

"Yeah, right!" Sam shook himself out of the stupor he seemed to have fallen into. "Well, good night."

"Good night, Sam." And as Sam finally turned and left the room Dean hit Penny's speed dial and waited to hear the ringing tone. "That is one weird dude," he breathed. While he waited for her to pick up he wandered into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator. Quickly spotting some chicken he broke off a leg and the sizeable chunk of meat that came with it. He also pulled out a carton of milk and chugged on that while he searched for a plate.

"Hey, Dean, how are you?" Penny's voice asked him.

"Hey, Babe. What are you wearing?"

"Housecoat and bunny slippers."

"You know you're not supposed to tell the truth when I ask you that, don't you?"

"I wasn't. I'm really wearing thigh length boots and a thong. But I wasn't going to tell _you_that."

Dean chuckled. "You're killing me. Ooh pie!" Dean pulled the remainder of the apple pie out and started searching for a knife while chowing down on the chicken leg.

"Are you feeding your face as usual?"

"I'm starving, Babe!" Dean explained through semi-masticated chicken. "I haven't eaten since the bus depot."

"I take it you're home now, then. How did you get there from the depot."

"Hitched."

"You shouldn't do that."

"Hell, I'm safer on the road than I am in my own living room."

"How's that?"

"Nothing." Dean didn't want to talk about the humiliating incident, nor the fact that his father had seen fit to install some complete stranger into his room the moment he was out of the house. "Tell me what's been happening at school." While Penny related the events he'd missed while he'd been en route home Dean scoffed his makeshift meal. The major news was that Jimmy Marsters and a couple of the guys from the other house had been expelled. _Goddamn_. Dean had been lucky to escape with a suspension. He glanced at his watch but it was way too late to think of calling Jimmy now. That could wait until the next day.

"You dodged a bullet, there, Dean," Penny scolded him.

"Well, it's not such a big deal. If they're not expelling me they have to let me back for the exams, and I can revise for those as easily here as there."

"What did your father say when you told him?"

"He hasn't taken me out to the woodshed yet." Dean heaved in a quick breath. "I have that to look forward to."

"Dean, you always make your father out to be such a bear. I bet he's really a pussy cat."

"Yeah, well, this pussy cat can kill with disappointment at twenty paces." The bravado left Dean's voice and he toyed listlessly with the stripped chicken bone. "He let me do what I wanted, Pen, and I promised him I'd make it work this time. I can't afford to screw up again. I think Dad's fresh out of second chances."

"Maybe should have thought about that before you got into that fight."

"What could I do, Pen? Jimmy's a friend; I couldn't leave him out to dry." He heard Penny sigh at the other end of the line.

"Dean, I love that you're loyal. I really do. But you don't have to make yourself responsible for all Jim Marsters' fiascos. You're not his keeper. He's just trouble looking for a place to happen."

"Now you sound like my dad."

"Then maybe you should listen to him. He sounds like a smart guy."

"He is," Dean admitted ruefully. "That's the trouble." A discordant musical cacophony suddenly sounded from the next room. "Hold on." Dean checked around the door, but all that had happened was that his guitar had slipped down from where he'd left it leaning against a wall.

"What is it, Dean?"

"Nothing, Babe." He finished off the remainder of the pie and chugged some more milk then wandered back into the living room, picked up the guitar and shifted it to a safer place in a corner. "So are you missing me?"

"Dean, it's been forty-eight hours."

"Forty-nine," Dean corrected her. He checked his watch again; "and thirty-seven minutes. And you _know_that's a long time for me."

"You're incorrigible."

Dean grinned. Unbuttoning his boxers and shucking them off he hastily arranged the bedding over the couch and slid himself beneath the covers.

"So what are _you_wearing?" Penny quizzed him.

"Nothing but a smile and a perky little boner," he replied.

She laughed. "Since when has it ever been _little_?"

"Aw, Babe, you're making me blush!" Dean chuckled, not blushing at all.

Sam got no further than the entrance hall before he remembered that he had not yet protected the front entrance of the house, and the irony was not lost on him that he had just emptied the last of his holy water all over the man he was supposed to be saving. Fortunately Sam kept a crucifix permanently in the bottom of the bottle so he only needed to visit the cloakroom and refill it, blessing the fresh water on his way back to the hall. Opening the door as quietly as he could, he quickly enscribed and encanted over the portal then closed it again. Now there was only the problem of the living room, which was open plan. There was no door to protect, and it bothered Sam sorely that Dean would be sleeping in a vulnerable space. He stood outside the room contemplating the problem and chewing his lip for several moments before making an unusual decision. The most powerful protective charm he owned was currently hanging around his own neck. It had been given to him by another hunter when he was a small child, and he had worn it continuously from that day. Now he found himself slipping it over his head and off. A check of the living room established that Dean was in the kitchen and out of eye-shot, so he slipped back into the room and over to the couch and slipped the amulet between its cushions. It was the best he could do for now.

Then Sam made his third biggest mistake of the evening (attacking his employer's son being the second biggest). He started backing out of the room, keeping his eye on the kitchen to make sure Dean wasn't about to emerge from it. As he stepped backwards he felt his foot make contact with an object behind him, and it shifted. He froze immediately but it was too late. He could already hear the ominous sound of something sliding against the wall, and the next moment the room was filled with what sounded to him like the loudest noise in the history of loud noises as a guitar he hadn't noticed before fell to the floor and announced his presence with all its twanging, clattering, resounding malice. That was when Sam made his biggest mistake of all. He panicked.

He dived behind the nearest object that would hide him, which happened to be the couch. Cursing his own clumsiness, and cursing the infernal instrument (how many fucking guitars did Dean have anyway?) he peered around the edge of the couch to see how Dean had responded to the noise. Not surprisingly, he was at the entrance to the kitchen and staring searchingly around the room.

"Nothing, Babe," Sam heard him say, and sighed with relief. Dean then disappeared back into the kitchen and Sam rose to make his exit, but then he heard Dean coming back again. The full realization of what an appallingly amateur tactical error he'd made hit him as Dean walked over to the guitar and repositioned it in the corner. The couch was between Sam and the living room entrance, and there was no way Sam could reach it without moving into Dean's eye-line. He could only hope that Dean would go back to the kitchen or he was likely to be stuck there all night.

Sam moved further into the shadows behind the couch, choosing a vantage point from which he could observe Dean's movements without being seen. "So did you miss me?" Dean was asking. Sam frowned. As Dean moved closer to a lampstand the light was picking out marks on his body that Sam hadn't noticed before in the dimly lit room: bruises, bad ones, and for an irrational moment Sam worried he'd put them there but he knew he hadn't, and a second glance confirmed they were some days old, but it was clear Dean had been in a fight recently and not fared too well in the exchange.

"Forty-nine," Dean checked his watch, "and thirty-seven minutes. And you _know_that's a long time for me." He unbuttoned his boxers.

_OH CRAP!_Sam quickly moved back and shifted his focus to the wall straight ahead of him. Not quickly enough. That image was going to be permanently burned onto his retinas.

And the worst of it was that Dean clearly wasn't planning to return to the kitchen any time soon. Sam could hear him making up his bed and getting ready to settle down for the night. The best that Sam could hope was that the phone call would end soon then he might be able to slip out once Dean fell asleep.

"Nothing but a smile and a perky little boner."

_What?_ Sam's eyes widened as his mind reluctantly performed some uncomfortably simple mental arithmetic. _Oh no. Oh, please god he's not going to — _

"Aw, Babe, you're making me blush!"

_Oh no no no no no no no no nooooooooooooooooooo!_

"So why don't you tell me what you're really wearing?"

_FUCK!_ Sam's heart was racing, and every adrenalin soaked muscle in his body was screaming _"FLIGHT! FLIGHT! FLIGHT!"_but there was nowhere to fly to.

"You can tell me. You know there's nothing I can't work with."

All he could do was keep his mind focused on the pattern of the wallpaper dead ahead and try not to listen to —

"Shirts are good. Shirts have buttons. I like buttons. I can undo them . . . very, very, _very_slowly. I can slide my fingers either side of the button until you can feel my fingertips just brushing your flesh under the cotton . . ."

Sam was holding his breath . . .

" . . . lifting the material with my thumb. You can feel it strain gently, then a little more, a little more, until you feel it pop and the cotton parts and you feel the air touch the exposed flesh beneath . . ."

. . . trying to let it out slowly and lightly so his breathing wouldn't be audible.

"and I bend down and lay the softest of soft kisses right where your shirt has parted."

Sam clamped his jaw shut. Right next to the couch was the towel Dean had been using to dry himself off. Sam reached out, snagged it with the tips of his fingers, started drawing it slowly toward him . . .

"Now I'm moving up the line of your breast bone, pecking gently at the flesh with my lips . . ."

. . . and lifted it in front of his mouth to stifle the sound of his panting.

" . . . over your shoulder blade, up toward your neck, and now I'm running just the tip of my tongue in a half circle round that sensitive skin just behind your ear . . ."

_Oh no. Oh Christ!_ He was getting hard. _Why_was he getting hard?

" . . . and my hands are stroking your body, gently, slowly, drinking in the feel of every little bit of you. I love the feel of you, Babe. Do you love the feel of me, too? Do you love how warm my hands feel through your shirt as I'm massaging your skin?" Dean's breath caught and he let out a soft sigh that sent an electric skitter down Sam's spine. "Oh, I wanna kiss you, Babe," Dean breathed. "Do you want me to kiss you?" Something stirred low, very low and deep in Sam's belly. It quivered and ached. "Yeah? . . . Oh, yeah, you do. Brush, your lips with your fingers — very lightly, very, very softly — imagine it's me."

Sam began to raise his hand toward his mouth, realized what he was doing half way, shook out his fingers and placed his hand determinedly back down on the carpet. This was so wrong. This was so many kinds of _wrong._

"Touch your tongue with your fingers. Imagine it's my tongue. Imagine it's slipping into your mouth . . . little bit . . . little more . . . little more . . ." Sam's fingers were digging into the carpet now. "Now take your fingers right into your mouth. I'm doing it too. I'm imagining I'm kissing you. Mmm." Sam's fingers were in his mouth. He had no recollection how they got there but, oh yes, he was imagining Dean's tongue, Dean's lips, _oh god yes, those lips, those lips_ and then he was imagining what else those lips could do _no no no that way madness lies_ God he was getting so _hard._He heard Dean chuckle. "You know I can't do that, Babe" Sam shook his head, took his fingers out of his mouth and stuffed the towel into it. "I haven't even got your shirt off yet. Hell, I've only undone one button. We're not in a rush here, are we? I wanna take my time, make it last."

_Oh jesus._ Sam wondered, _how long?_How long was Dean going to make him endure this torment?

"Well, maybe one more button now. Maybe I'll undo it with my teeth so you can feel my breath warming your skin, getting hot under your shirt, over your ribs and down your belly . . ." Sam's nostrils flared and he had to pinch his nose to stopper the sound of the snort. His eyes were beginning to water with the strain of keeping silent. "and now I'm just brushing your nipple with the tips of my fingers . . ." _oh jesus fucking Christ take the fucking shirt off will you?_ "Oo! Babe! Such language! And you look so sweet and innocent!" The language in Sam's head wasn't getting any better, and what was going on in his pants was damnation. It was so cramped behind this couch there wasn't even room to stretch out his legs, and his cock felt like it wanted to bust right through his jeans. "You wanna feel my tongue then, Babe? You want me to take it in my mouth?" _Oh please don't. Please stop. Please just shut up. It hurts._ "Guess, I'll have to take your shirt off, then." _Yes! Thank you! Yes! Get on with it!_ "OK, I'm undoing the rest of the buttons then . . . pop . . . pop . . . pop . . . pop . . . and sliding my hands underneath, running them all . . . over . . . you . . . mmm . . . feels good, Babe. Love the feel of you under my hands." _What is this guy made of? How is he not driving himself nuts?_Sam managed to swivel himself sideways, into a position where he could stretch out just a little. It gave him some measure of relief, but the tightness and throbbing in his groin was still murder. "Lifting your shirt off your shoulders now, running my lips over them, nibbling, licking, moving down . . . nibbling, sucking, moving down . . .kissing, licking, moving down . . . pecking, suckling, nearly there . . ." Sam's eyes were so wide they hurt, he was chewing the towel, he wasn't breathing at all. ". . . nearly there . . ." Dean's voice was a breathy whisper. It sent gooseflesh down Sam's spine, ghosting over his lower back, over his buttocks. _God._ He could feel it in his balls. "I'm taking your nipple between my lips." Sam's toes curled into the carpet. "I'm drawing it into my mouth, circling it softly with my tongue . . . is it getting stiff, Babe?" Yes, it fucking was. "I'm drawing my tongue ever so slowly over the stiff peak, rolling it under my tongue, soothing it with my lips." Sam gripped his nose again to forestall another flaring snort. "And . . . moving down." Sam so nearly, oh so nearly groaned out loud as he was taken by a violent shudder of excitement. Tears were streaming from eyes that were so tightly shut it was giving him a headache. "Running the tip of my tongue round your navel now, peppering your belly with kisses, like the wings of a butterfly, Babe." Sam found himself fingering the belt of his jeans. The trapped monster of his flesh was screaming to be released. "Take them down for me, Babe." Dean's voice was low and deep and husky, and somewhere deep inside Sam there was an answering primal growl. _No. Wrong. Bad. Bad idea. Don't._But he was going to. Very carefully, he began easing the leather out of its clasps. "Slowly, Babe," Dean whispered. He had to be slow, had to be so careful that not a whisper of what he was doing reached the other side of the couch. In the quietness of the room he could hear Dean breathing. It had quickened and taken on a slightly raspy quality. The beast inside growled again. Sam felt its claws in his bowels.

Almost one tooth at a time, Sam lowered the zipper on his jeans and when, at length, he had them undone the blessed relief of having his cock free of their restriction made his whole body tingle. "I'm sliding my hands inside them, Babe, under the denim, you can feel their warmth stroking over your belly . . ." It had taken Sam off guard and he stopped himself a hair's breadth from slamming his head back against the couch. He bit hard into the towel but a ghost of a whimper still escaped his nostrils, and for long moments his heart raced frantically as he listened for any sign that Dean had heard it " . . . they're moving over the curve of your hips now . . ." Scooping up and bunching the towel he buried his face in it so he could pant his relief unheard, "sliding under your bottom, cupping you in my hands, fondling and massaging . . ." then he needed it to wipe off the rivers of sweat that were flowing from every pore. ". . . tugging them down now, down, down your thighs, off —" Dean drew in a sharp breath and blew out again hard. "Getting excited now, Babe." _Now? Now you're getting excited? Seriously, are you made of steel?_"Wanna kiss your thighs, wanna . . . mm . . . bite . . . mm just a little," He was getting excited. Sam could hear it in his thickened voice, in the tremor in his breath — and in the deep, the claws flexed, Sam's lips curled back and he bared his teeth. He wanted to be on the other side of that couch, wanted to bury his fingers in Dean's hair, his tongue in his mouth, wanted to feel himself all over his naked body . . . " . . . tongue lapping your belly now, backwards and forwards along the hem of your pants . . ."

G-GUH! Sam mouthed into the towel ". . . f — fingers exploring the soft f-flesh at the crease of your thighs, sliding under the hem, into your pants, feeling your hair b-brushing my finger tips — " _oh god god god take them off take them off! _— "Wait." _What?_

"Wait a minute," Dean gasped.

_Wait? What? What are you - ? What?_

Sam heard the sound of covers being thrown back. A silence where Dean seemed to be holding his breath — What was he doing? Then he was breathing again, a little ragged at first but slowing, getting calmer, then "Sorry, Babe. Got a bit carried away there for a moment."

_I'm going to kill you, you lunatic, what are you playing at?_

"Now, where was I?"

_Don't know. Don't care. Going to kill you, freak!_

"Now, you know you don't mean it, Babe. You know you love the feel of my tongue on your belly."

_Nope. Not playing. Not listening._

"My lips . . ." . . ._ Oh . . . damn_ . . . "cupping your flesh, suckling . . . while I'm lowering your pants, a little at a time . . . moving down . . ." _Damn you!_ The beast rose up again and snarled; fire and feral craving filled Sam's flesh and he was aching, aching, aching, aching . . . "So close now . . . you can feel my breath . . .it's hot . . . moist . . ." _oh god oh god oh god oh god_ "Lift your hips up for me, Babe." Sam's hips gave an involuntary upward buck. And again. _Damn._ Now he'd started he couldn't seem to stop. "Wanna taste you now, Babe. You want me to? . . . Yes?" _Yes._ "Yes?" _Yes! Yes! Do it! Do it! For fuck's sake!_ "OK pants coming down now, down your thighs, over your knees, off, my hands sliding back up your thighs, spreading you, lips seeking you, mouth closing over you, tongue seeking you, finding you, tasting you, mmm . . ." Dean was panting again. He took a deep breath to steady himself. "My tongue's all over you, Babe, long, slow, wet, strokes, tasting, swallowing, mmm — mmm . . . god, yeah! Love your taste!" Sam listened, eyes half closed, heavy lidded and unseeing, fingers digging into the carpet, heels pushing at the floor, and then his hand reached into the opening of his jeans. _Bad bad bad bad bad idea_ warned some tiny corner of his brain that was still working, oh but it felt _so good_ and the working corner was snuffed out. "Wanna know what my fingers are doing, Babe?" _Um . . . do I? Maybe . . . maybe, yes . . . maybe . . . yes, please?_ "First I'm sliding one finger, just the tip, inside you . . ." _mm not sure?_ But the beast was sure; it growled and purred, wanted more. ". . . now I'm taking it out, slipping the next one in . . . just the tip . . . then the next . . . now they're all there, playing, strumming, I'm playing you the way I play my guitar, Babe." Sam was shuddering down the whole length of his body. _Fucking god!_"Want to feel them right inside you, Babe? Want me to touch you where it makes you shudder and moan?" Sam didn't even know what that would feel like yet the growl inside seemed to know. Sam slipped his thumb into his mouth and got it as wet as he could. As he slipped it beneath the material of his boxers he was past caring about the wisdom of what he was doing, he could feel the first tremors of orgasm building in his loins, spreading over his back, but then the couch creaked and he heard Dean sit up and for a moment his heart was hammering in his mouth. Had Dean heard something?

"Are you close, Babe?" His voice was low and breathless, but startlingly clear and and close sounding now that it was less muffled by the couch. "Are you gonna come for me? Yeah?" _Yeah, oh yeah, oh god, do you read my mind? Read my mind, Dean, I'm coming for you, I'm coming._ Dean drew in a sharp stammering breath then vented an unfettered cry of pleasure and satisfaction that thrilled through Sam's body like an electric charge. Sam could hear Dean's movements now, the urgent rhythm of his hand, and it vaguely crossed his mind to wonder whether Dean had touched himself at all up to that point or whether his only thought had been for — but then all coherent thought was wiped away as the wave hit and at that moment he heard Dean cry out "God! Babe, I wanna be with you now, I wanna be inside you, I wanna feel you come around me, I want you, I love you, Babe, I love you, GOD!" Dean was beating and thrashing against the couch while Sam was locked in a silent, violent spasm that shuddered through his whole body and mind and made his teeth chatter. Piercing, aching, intense pleasure beat through his balls and his cock and spread its fire through his abdomen glowing up through his body from the base of his spine, its hot fingers spreading up his back and chest, shoulders neck, it felt like he could feel it in his hair, and with each beat hot cum was spurting into his pants again and again. _Dear god dear god what was happening to him . . . ?_And afterwards he felt stunned and exhausted. He'd never come like that before, never, and it scared him.

. . .

If he'd thought Dean would fall asleep soon after that he was wrong. He stayed on the phone to his girlfriend for what seemed like hours — may only have been ten or fifteen minutes — talking to her. If listening to phone sex had felt inappropriate and uncomfortable, being party to this private, intimate and cringingly sentimental exchange between lovers was mortifying and Sam wished himself anywhere, _anywhere_else in the world but in the proximity of that conversation. But eventually, to Sam's overwhelming relief, it came to an end. Dean's last softly spoken sentence was "Babe? . . . Babe? . . . Pen . . .? . . . Penny, are you asleep?" a whispered "night, Babe," and then Sam heard him close the phone.

Sam had to shake himself to full alertness. He realized he'd been in danger of falling asleep himself, but then something happened that shook him fully awake. Dean's hand was reaching around the back of the couch, feeling around on the floor. With a sick sinking sensation in the pit of his stomach, Sam realized that he was searching for the towel, and it was likely that if he didn't find it his next move would be to actually _look_ behind the couch. Sam couldn't see any alternative; he pushed the sweaty, saliva drenched rag within reach of Dean's questing fingers and _prayed_that he wouldn't notice even though it seemed impossible that Dean could miss it. Sam waited nauseously for the reaction, but it never came. Perhaps it was because the towel had already been damp (though it seemed unlikely that Dean wouldn't notice the difference between saliva and rain), perhaps Dean was tired and not paying attention, or perhaps the cruel and capricious gods that yanked the strings of his existence had decided that they had humiliated and screwed with Sam enough for one night.

Whatever the reason, it appeared he had finally caught a break. Dean used the towel, dropped it back on the floor, then got up and turned out the light before returning to the couch and settling down to sleep. As anxiety faded he found that it was replaced by new and conflicting feelings. The knowledge that Dean had just wiped his body with a towel soaked in Sam's bodily fluids filled him with an uncomfortable mixture of shame and indecent satisfaction.

Within a few minutes Dean's breathing had slowed to the steady rhythm of a light snore and after a few more Sam judged that it would be safe to leave his hiding place . . . as safe as it was ever going to be. Still his heart was pounding as he stood up, buttoned his jeans and tiptoed out of the room, longing to run, not daring to. It took until he was all the way back upstairs and into the bedroom before he could convince himself that he'd gotten away with it. And long after he'd climbed into bed his heart was still racing, and not just from the fear of being caught.

Sam turned on his side and stared unseeingly into space, his head and flesh buzzing. What the fuck had just happened? His mind was broiling with images that spawned more images, and each one stewed its own broth of wholly unfamiliar cravings. While the world around him seethed with its obsession with sex and the flesh, Sam had always remained aloof and mystified by the power it seemed to exert over others. He was indifferent to its allures and revolted by its carnality; his few fumbling sexual encounters had been motivated by little more than idle curiosity, and had left him unsatisfied and more puzzled than before; he had found nothing there to attract him. His own body and its needs were more often a source of irritation and inconvenience than pleasure. But Dean Winchester held a fascination for him the like of which he had never felt before. Radiating sensuality from every line of his face and body, oozing it from every pore, Dean seemed utterly at home in his physicality, reveling in it. Assured in his expertise he still somehow seemed to retain the innocent joy of a child; sex was his playground. He was everything Sam was not, and that thought frightened and disturbed Sam while, at the same time, it exerted a profound and irresistible attraction. It was as if Dean embodied the promise of some secret knowledge that Sam feared and was drawn to, the way a wild animal circled a fire. Some monster that slept undisturbed inside him for years had been stirring restlessly since that first time he'd dreamt about Dean, and now it had awoken and roared. It had Dean's scent now and it pawed at Sam's belly, growled its hunger and demanded to be satisfied.

Sam sat up sharply and shook his head, trying to clear the unbidden ideas and images that were crowding his mind. He wished he could open up his skull, take out his brain and wash it clean of the impure thoughts. He was supposed to be protecting Dean from the demon, but right at that moment he felt as if he were the very thing that Dean needed protection from.


	3. I Am the Tune Play Me Part 2

His father hammered on the bathroom door. "Come on, Dean! Don't spend all day in there. There are people in this house who work for a living!"

Dean checked his watch and pursed his lips. "Not even seven in the morning," he muttered. "I think that's a record for you, Dad." Sighing, he put down the hairdryer and gazed into the mirror. In the bright morning sunlight the bruises on his face and his split lip were more apparent. He briefly toyed with the idea of borrowing some of his mother's concealer but reflected that was highly unlikely to help. Slipping a towel round his waist he moved over to the door and listened. He couldn't hear Dad or anyone else outside, which was good. He didn't want to run into his father until he was dressed.

He paused outside his own room and knocked . . . his _own room_, mind you! "Hey, Sam!" he called out, "Can I get in there? I need some clothes."

The door opened so quickly he was slightly taken aback. Sam was standing there already neat, showered and fully dressed with his backpack over his shoulder. How freakin' early did _he_ get up?

Sam seemed equally startled. His gaze dropped from Dean's face down the length of his body then quickly scurried elsewhere. "Sure, of course. It's all yours," he said, still avoiding eye contact as he left the room and stood aside to let Dean in. Dean noticed Sam was avoiding his gaze and, if he wasn't mistaken, blushing slightly. He smirked a little as he closed the door between them and dropped the towel on his bed. _That boy definitely has issues_, he thought.

To give him due credit, Sam had left the room as he'd found it. The bed was neatly made up and all trace of his occupancy had been removed except for the slightest hint of an unfamiliar scent: a mixture of soap and engine oil and something herbal. As Dean opened a drawer there was a knock at the door and he could hear Sam clearing his throat. Dean glanced at the towel on the bed and grinned. He was tempted . . . _Nah. Be nice, Dean._ Wrapping the towel back around himself he opened the door.

"Hey, Sammy! Forget something?"

Sam frowned.  
><em><br>Oh, yeah_, Dean remembered. _He doesn't like that. Oops._

Sam had something in his hand, a small jar. He held it out to Dean. "You might find this . . . It's good for bruises," he said.

Dean raised his eyebrows and his head twitched back a little. "Really? Well, er, thanks." He took the proffered jar and examined it. "What is it?"

"It's a homemade . . . herbal . . . remedy." Sam was still having trouble making eye contact, and still blushing. "Trust me. It helps." He shrugged and made his exit. Dean opened the jar and sniffed the contents cautiously, jerking back his head as something sharp in the mixture made his eyes sting. Other than that, it wasn't unpleasant smelling. He gave it a try and after a few moments it felt like it was doing something. "Hmm," Dean grunted. Well, that was thoughtful, he supposed. He cautiously allowed that Sam seemed to be an OK sort of guy, issues notwithstanding.

He took his time getting dressed. He spent a while reacquainting himself with his room, opening drawers and cupboards reminding himself where he'd left things. He flicked idly through the pages of a few of his books. He even picked up one of his old guitars and played it for a while to remind himself how that sounded.

It wasn't that he was putting off going downstairs, because what would be the point in that? Even if he could avoid Dad until he left for work, even if he could stay out of his way that evening until after he'd gone out to meet his poker buddies, and go to bed before he got back, and even if he skipped breakfast tomorrow as well and could delay the inevitable maybe as much as a whole day or two, still it would come. Putting it off was only prolonging the agony, and though a coward dies a thousand times . . .

He wondered why Dad even bothered. Seriously, what could he say that he hadn't already said when Dean dropped out of law school, or when he flunked business studies? What fresh pearls of wisdom could he find now to make Dean more aware of his screw-up status than he already was?

But maybe that was the heart of the matter. What if Dad did decide that it just wasn't worth his while to keep lecturing or yelling any more? Maybe what he really couldn't face was the possibility that he'd reached the point where Dad would simply give up on him. Dean dropped his face into his hands and sighed heavily as he slowly drew his fingers down to his chin.

"Dean!" His mother's voice called up the stairs. "Breakfast is ready, Sweetheart!"

He smiled in spite of himself. As meals go, they didn't get much heartier than one of his mother's breakfasts. And if there was a gnawing sensation in his stomach and if his legs felt a little wobbly as he made his way downstairs, well, that was just because he was hungry.

Dad was already there when Dean reached the breakfast table. He grunted an acknowledgement as Dean sat down, but his attention was absorbed by the morning newspaper. Mom was busying herself in the kitchen and as Dean helped himself to a coffee he tipped a wink at their enigmatic house guest who was seated opposite him. Sam managed a kind of half smile in return but . . . what the hell? He was _still_ blushing. What was the matter with the dude?

"The usual, Sweetheart?" his mother asked.

"Yes, please, Mom."

"Did you sleep OK, last night?"

"Like a log."

"And did you remember to put your wet things in the laundry?"

"Yes, Mom."

"You were very wet when you got here last night. Did you have far to walk?"

"Not far."

"How did you get here from the bus depot?"

Dean hesitated, knowing she wasn't going to like the answer. "Ah . . . I got a lift, Mom," he said, trying to phrase it so it sounded more innocuous but she wasn't fooled.

"You mean you hitch-hiked? You know I don't like you doing that!"

"Don't worry, Mom. I can take care of myself."

Dad found himself unable to restrain a quiet scoff. Dean couldn't altogether blame him. The claim did sound a little thin when all evidence to the contrary was sitting right opposite him.

"Well, that's assuming I'm not up against Sasquatch meets Dirty Harry here," he added.

"Dean! Don't be so rude," his mother scolded him.

"I'm just kidding, Mom," Dean explained hastily. "Sam gets that. Don't you, Sam?"

Sam looked up from his breakfast plate and twitched his lips into the briefest and tightest of smiles.

Yeeeaah . . . Nah. He didn't get it. In fact, Dean wasn't sure this guy would know what a sense of humour was if he sat on it and it farted. He studied the young man curiously. In the light of day (and sitting down) he didn't seem quite as intimidating as he had the previous night. He was sporting a rather harsh buzz cut that, coupled with his height, gave him a somewhat aggressive appearance at first glance, but now Dean looked more closely at his face he realized to his surprise that the features were quite delicate, soft-skinned, almost effeminate. He had attractive, almond-shaped eyes framed by a long fringe of soft eye-lashes. They were an unusual colour, too: hazel flecked with gold, but when the light hit them there was a hint of blue as well. Pouty cupid's bow lips set off his features. He even had a cute little beauty spot to the left of his cute little nose . . . and dimples . . . there was just a suggestion of dimples there. It was a sweet face. When he was relaxed there was something gentle, almost angelic looking about him. _Huh_.

He was younger than Dean had originally supposed him to be, too. It was hard to say exactly how old . . . he could have been as young as seventeen, though from his stature Dean guessed he was probably at least twenty, but he couldn't be much older than that.

"How tall are you, anyway, Sam?" he asked.

"Six foot four," the young man responded.

"Hmm." Dean raised his eyebrows and gave an impressed nod. "You've got almost three inches on me," he acknowledged. Then after a moment he added "Of course, I'm just talking about height, you understand." He grinned.

Sam lifted his eyes from his plate and he gazed at Dean for a moment as a slight twitch tugged at the corners of his lips, then he dropped his gaze once more but the smile broadened, emphasizing the dimples in his cheeks. _Well, what do you know_? Maybe he did have a sense of humour after all. But as Dean watched Sam he started to be just a tiny bit unsettled by that smile. There was something just a little too confident about it. As if Sam was enjoying a joke of his own that he wasn't sharing.

Dean's thoughts were interrupted as his mother emerged from the kitchen with plates in hand. She placed Dean's breakfast in front of him and a plate of muffins in the centre of the table. As she leaned over the table she smiled at Dean, then the smile faltered.

"Sweetheart! What have you done to your face?"

_Crap. Now for it._ "It's nothing, Mom," Dean tried to assure her. Then, as her eyes strayed suspiciously toward Sam he hastily added, "ancient history!" to forestall her attaching any unjust blame to the kid.

"Let me see," his father demanded, reaching across and turning Dean's face toward him, none too gently. He examined the bruising grimly. "Not that ancient," he pronounced. "You've been in a fight? At college?"

"That isn't like you, dear!" Mom exclaimed.

"I take it this is why you were suspended."

_Fuck._ Dean's heart dropped like a boulder into his stomach, and silence prowled around the table with its hackles raised and teeth bared.

"John!" Mom hissed, with a significant glance toward Sam who was looking so hunched and uncomfortable that Dean actually felt more sorry for him for a moment than he did for himself.

Dad turned a level gaze toward him. "Finish your breakfast, Sam," he said in a quiet calm voice that completely robbed Dean of his own appetite, though he noticed ruefully that it motivated Sam to clear his plate as quickly as possible. Mom sat down and started to eat as well, but she was tight lipped throughout the rest of the meal. At length Sam emptied his plate and hastily swigged the rest of his coffee. As he stood up and thanked Mom for the meal he was clearly preparing to make a hasty exit from the powder-keg situation, but as he turned from the table Dad detained him.

"I'm going to be late in today, Sam," he explained, ominously. "Do me a favour and take the car in for me, would you, please?"

And Dean watched in dumb shock and dismay as his father reached into his pocket, took out the keys to the Impala and handed them to a _COMPLETE FUCKING STRANGER!_


	4. I Am the Tune Play Me Part 3

Dean's jaw locked, his fists clenched and he concentrated everything he had on keeping control. Damned if he was going to let himself break down in front of the oversized freak. _Damned_ if he was! But one look at Sam's face was enough to let Dean know that his own was a picture-book open at the chapter entitled "Humiliation". He shot a look of reproach at his father but Dad wasn't looking at him. Dean understood that he was in the woodshed now. He just hadn't expected the first stroke to be so hard.

Sam wasn't taking the keys. Instead he simply turned and picked up his back-pack from where he'd left it behind his chair and started lifting it over his shoulders. "It's OK, John, I don't need the car, thanks," he said. "I don't mind walking. I'm used to it."

John slammed the keys down on the table in front of him. "Dammit, Sam, I said take the car!" he snapped. "Now just do it and get gone! Does everything have to be an argument with you?"

Sam stiffened. Dean watched as his jaw and face muscles tightened, then his nostrils flared and – _WHOA!_ Dean's heart started racing with something between acute anxiety and awe. He'd never seen _anyone_ look at John Winchester that way before, not if they hoped to look at anything else, ever again. Something, some innate impulse was trying to urge Dean to his feet. He had to physically restrain himself from jumping up and pushing himself between them, as if he could hope to protect or prevent either of these two giants from going at it if they had a mind to. But he was silently willing Sam to notice him, to catch his glance, understand his expression. _Let it go, Sam! Let it go!_ Someone needed to tell him . . . he needed to understand, you just don't argue with Dad when he's in this mood!

In those moments, as Dean listened to the sound of his own blood pumping in his ears, he saw Sam glance at him, saw him catch the almost imperceptible shake of the head Dean gave him and the mute appeal that pleaded with him not to prolong the confrontation any further, saw the fire that was blazing in those suddenly dark eyes recede just a little. _OK. _Dean started to breathe again. _OK, now just take the keys and go, and just let me get this freakin'_ _nightmare over with._

Sam hesitated only a moment longer, then his hand reached toward the table and his fingers closed around the keys. As he picked them up his jaw jutted outward and his head craned to one side, then he left without a word. But as he turned to go he threw one last enigmatic look at Dean, and just then the sunlight caught his eyes and lit them up bright blue. It reminded Dean of something; he couldn't quite put his finger on what it was, yet somehow it made him feel a bit better.

In the silence that followed Dad poured himself another cup of coffee while Dean tried to sort out the wild tangle of emotions the freakish scene had stirred in him. The rational part of Dean's brain acknowledged that most of his ambivalence toward Sam was due to his father having used the kid as a stick to beat him with, and that Sam was in no way to blame for that. Nevertheless, the angry child in him felt the sting of being denied a toy only to see it given away and as his father waited him out, forcing him to take responsibility for starting the conversation, it was the resentment that took possession of him, and he could think of only one thing to say.

"How long have you known, Sam, Dad?" he asked, trying to make his voice sound calm and conversational.

"He's been working with us about a month," Dad replied, equally casually.

"So you don't _really _know him, then?" Dean took a breath before continuing. "I mean, you've just handed the Impala over to a guy you really don't know anything about. Is that who you'd rather trust than your own son?" As the last sentence came out his voice betrayed him with a petulant sounding squeak, perhaps because he hadn't really intended to say that part out loud at all.

His father took a sip of his coffee then turned a level gaze on Dean that made his insides wither. "I'll tell you what I know about Sam," he said. "He's been in town a month and I just found out last night he's been sleeping out by the lake all that time. Far as I can tell he has three shirts to his name and two pairs of jeans, but he turns up to work each day neat and clean. He puts in a full day, never skimps, and does everything to the best of his ability. There've been times he hasn't had enough to eat, but he's never asked for a hand out. Everything he owns fits in that backpack of his, and everything he has he's had a long time, and it's all well cared for. That's why I'm willing to trust him with the things I value, Dean. I know if I give Sam something to take care of, he'll look after it. You've never taken care of anything in your life, Dean. I've been waiting twenty-six years for you to show some sense of responsibility. I'm still waiting."

Dean stared at the table where his finger was tracing slow mechanical patterns on the table cloth.

"Do I need to go on, Dean?"

Dean swallowed. His voice was husky when he spoke. "No, Dad. You've made your point."

His father leaned back and took a long swallow from his coffee. "So, tell me about this fight," he said when he set it down.

"I didn't start it, Dad. I was backing up a friend." Dean felt a spark of conviction begin to heat his words as he continued. "You'd want me to stand by my friends, wouldn't you, Dad? You know you'd do the same!"

"Which friend are we talking about here, Dean? Jimmy Marsters?"

The conviction Dean had been standing on deflated instantly and he fell silent.

"You could choose your friends more wisely, Dean. I told you that boy was trouble first time I met him."

Dean knew it. Jim was arrogant and rebellious. He was the worst possible influence on Dean but he was exciting and he was fun, and Dean couldn't resist him. Even so, Dean made one last effort to defend himself. He passed a hand round the back of his neck where the damp ends of his hair were irritating his skin.

"Dad, could you not allow for the possibility, just once, that not every problem begins and ends with me?"

His father leaned forward and held Dean's gaze. His expression was more serious than angry. "Dean, who else do you think there is?" He paused for a beat then he continued "Son, you need to realize there's not a damned thing in this life that you can control beyond your own decisions, and if you don't take responsibility for those you'll never be anything else but fortune's bitch." He sighed and now he just looked sad, and Dean's insides cramped painfully. That was worse than him being angry. Much worse. "Look, Dean, don't get me wrong. It's not that I'm not proud of you, for many things, your loyalty and your courage not least among them, but I'm worried about you. You just seem to be drifting. You don't seem to have any drive or direction, anything you really care about."

"That's not true, Dad!" Dean protested. "I care about you and Mom, for a start . . . and Penny," he added as an afterthought.

Dad smiled and sighed again. He shook his head. "Yes, you've always cared about other people."

"Well, what's wrong with that?"

"Nothing. Nothing." He shook his head again then he reached out and for a moment his hand rested affectionately against the side of Dean's head. He withdrew it again quickly as they both realized Dean was in danger of getting emotionally overwrought. "But you need to care about yourself, too. Isn't there anything you want for yourself, Dean?"

Dean squirmed uncomfortably. The only thing he could think to offer was the one thing his father saw no practical value in. "Well, there's my music . . ." He cleared his throat as he saw Dad trying to smother a look of impatience. "The band's doing well, Dad. We're getting engagements. People like our music, _my_ music - "

"And is that what you're planning to do when you finish your degree? What about the other members of the band? Are they committed or is this just something they're doing to get through college?"

"I'm training to be a sound engineer, Dad."

"And is that what you really want?"

Dean hesitated.

"You don't seem sure."

"Dad, what do you want from me?" Dean cried frustratedly. "It's a real job, I enjoy it and I'm good at it. What more do you want?"

His father was getting frustrated too. "It's not about what I want, Son!"

_You sure about that, Dad?_

They both fell silent. After a minute Dean made a final attempt to cut the Gordian Knot.

"Dad, I'm sorry about the suspension. It was stupid, but it won't affect anything. I'll go back for the exams, and I'll pass them. I've been getting good grades - "

"You got good grades at Law School, Dean, and at business studies at first, then you just seemed to give up - "

"Not this time, Dad, I promise you. I _promise_ you, I will finish this time."

Another beat and then Dad drained the dregs and looked at his watch, and Dean felt blessed relief flood over him. _Talk over._ "I'd better get to work. What are your plans for the day?"

"Uh . . ." Dean hadn't thought beyond getting through this interview.

"If you're going to be hanging round the house all day, at least make yourself useful to your mother."

"Right." Dean sighed inwardly.

As his father stood up he lifted Dean's chin and studied his face. "I hope you gave the other guy hell," he said smiling.

"Well, I think I bruised his knuckles pretty bad," Dean quipped, then wished he hadn't. Why did he have to do that? Why couldn't he just have made up something that made him sound like half the man his father wished he was?

A thump on the shoulder was Dad's parting affectionate gesture and Dean wandered into the kitchen where his mother was drying dishes. He picked up a cloth and joined her.

"Poor baby," she cooed, drawing his head down to her level and kissing his forehead. She drew her hands down his face and tried to lift the corners of his mouth into a smile. "He loves you very much, you know."

"I know, Mom."

"And he _is_ proud of you."

Dean smiled but said nothing. Honestly, what was there to be proud of?

His father appeared in the kitchen doorway. "I'm off now, Amanda," he said. "Is there anything you need me to pick up when I come home?"

"Not so fast, John." She dropped the dish cloth, gave John a prod out of the doorway and followed him through it. "I want a word with you before you leave." Dean cringed inwardly at her tone. Apparently his wasn't the only visit to the woodshed that day

He finished drying the dishes and put them away then he wandered into the living room, picked up his guitar and strummed idly until his jangling senses started to return to some kind of equilibrium. He hardly noticed the chords starting to fall into a pattern until he started humming snatches of a melody along with them, then he found odd phrases starting to occur to him.

"Hey, tall stranger . . ." he crooned. _Tall stranger? Dark stranger?_

"Hey, tall stranger knocking at my door . . ." He stood up and trailed his guitar over to his duffel bag, opened it and took out his laptop. Better get this down. It was always best to get things down straight away. _Door. Bore? Core? Heart's core? Nah. Too Shakespearean. For?_ He set up the laptop and booted it up.

"Middle of the night . . . In the middle of the night . . ." He strummed a few more chords. _Hore . . . Whore? . . . Jore . . . Jaw . . . Law_

The laptop beeped. He opened a page and started to type phrases.

"Hey, tall stranger knocking at my door

In the middle of the night"

_Tore . . . wore . . . war?_

_For. Floor! Yes!_

He typed another couple of sentences then started shaping and rearranging them. _Dark stranger. Angel. Dark Angel . . . Devil . . ._ He definitely had something now. It struck him that it had a kind of mythic quest feel to it. He picked up the guitar once more and worked up the chords into an epic rock riff, singing along with his first draft of the chorus, starting in a soft melodic tenor but finishing with his best Robert Plant impression.

"Hey, tall stranger knocking at my door

In the middle of the night, what you want me for?

Why d'you walk into my life, knock me to the floor?

Tall, dark stranger, what you want me for?

Are you an Angel or a Devil knocking at my door?"

.


	5. Fire Part 1

Chapter 3: Fire

_As Sam and Dean learn a little more about each other the omens gather._

. . .

Sam pushed the last of the crystals into the earth at the front of the house. He had now done everything he could think of to protect the family, yet he still felt uneasy. His mother had been a hunter, from a family of hunters. She had known everything that Sam knew, was well able to protect herself, yet she had died in flames on the bedroom ceiling just as Sam had dreamed Amanda would.

Thoughts of his mother troubled Sam as he recalled the uncomfortable day he had just spent at work. John had arrived mid-morning and had treated Sam affably, trying to behave as if nothing unusual had happened. Sam returned his overtures with cool brevity. He considered that John owed him an apology for dragging him into the family's domestic disputes and was disinclined to be forgiving when none was forthcoming. John had responded by becoming brusque, short and businesslike with Sam. It had made for an awkward work situation and for most of the day they had avoided each other as much as possible. Then, in the afternoon, John had surprised Sam by suddenly asking him out of the blue what his mother's name was. Still annoyed with John, Sam had lied readily and without shame but now he was beginning to question the wisdom of his own reticence. If John had once had some significant contact with the Campbell family he might have known they were hunters; he might just possibly have had some personal experience of the supernatural. If that were the case then the smart move would be to alert John to the threat his family was facing. But nothing about John's home suggested he had any knowledge of hunting. There were usually tell-tale signs: charms, symbols, books, unusually abundant supplies of salt . . . and weapons. John's stance on firearms alone argued against the likelihood that he would be open to the suggestion that his wife and son were the targets of a demon, and Sam couldn't imagine that an earthy, practical man like John would be very accepting of revelations that Sam was in the habit of receiving psychic visions. Most civilians would consider him to be a head case . . . and most hunters would consider him to be legitimate prey.

Sam wondered what reception he was going to get from Winchester Jr. when he entered the house. John had given Sam the truck rather than the Impala to drive home, which was a relief since the car was obviously a big issue with Dean, and Dean clearly had enough issues with Sam already. Plus which, Sam had seen Dean's moods swing through at least three different extremes within the space of a few seconds that morning, so he was evidently a highly emotionally volatile young man. That last one was strange, though, when Dean had suddenly and inexplicably seemed to be concerned for Sam's welfare and there had been that moment . . . that moment when they'd seemed to be in each other's heads . . . like they knew each other . . . Sam had fought side by side with other hunters, members of his own family, when life or death could depend on knowing each other's tells and when the minutest signals were enough to convey intention; but to share that kind of understanding with a complete stranger was impossible. Sam must have imagined it.

As Sam entered the house he could hear Dean's voice, singing rather loudly. He followed the sound to the living room where he found Dean strumming at a guitar – the same guitar that had betrayed Sam so unkindly the previous night. Dean had it jacked into his computer so all that could be heard of his playing was a stringy metallic jangling, and he was wearing headphones so he evidently couldn't hear himself. Presumably that was why he was singing so loudly . . . and not entirely in pitch. At first all Sam registered was the volume, but then he started to absorb the lyric. As irrational as it was to attribute significance to random words heard out of context, he couldn't help feeling chilled when he heard the last line:

"With a fire like hell burning in his eyes  
>He said, "Hey, brother, you'd better get wise.<br>You're life's going nowhere and you don't know why.  
>You'd better get your act together before you die!"<p>

Dean glanced up as he finished the verse.

"DUH!" he yelped, startling as if he'd been caught in a guilty act. "Son of a bitch!" Pulling off his headphones he closed the laptop a little hastily, as if trying to hide something. "How long have you been there?" he demanded.

"I just got in," Sam replied. _Now what?_

Dean just stared at him for a few moments then flashed the shark tooth grin. "Awk – ward!" he intoned in a sing song voice.

Sam just frowned, puzzled. He had no idea what Dean thought was so awkward so he moved on to practical matters. "Where should I put this?" he asked, indicating his back-pack.

"Oh, right. Mom's made up a bed for you in the den."

Sam followed Dean to the room where he'd be sleeping and dropped his back-pack in the corner. Dean hung in the doorway looking doubtfully from Sam to the cot.

"Are you going to fit in that?" he asked.

"I'll be fine," Sam assured him, a little testily. He was getting a bit tired of the constant references to his height.

Dean still looked doubtful. He opened his mouth and shut it again, then took a deep breath. "Are you sure? Cos, you could stay in my room if you like, if you'd be more comfortable there. I don't mind."

Sam couldn't help staring at him. Why would he do that? Why would he offer to sacrifice his own bed? It wasn't as if he was much shorter than Sam, he'd be equally uncomfortable on the cot.

"I'll be fine," Sam repeated, more insistently. "It's an improvement on a lot of places I've slept, I assure you." Sam started to unpack his toiletries and lay out the next day's clothes. He expected Dean to leave him to it but apparently he wasn't done. He sauntered into the room and stood by Sam's side, a little closer than Sam was comfortable with.

"So what are your plans this evening, Sam?" he asked.

"Plans?"

"I was planning to go into town. Wanna join me? I could show you where the cool dudes and loose women are."

Sam started to suspect he could see Amanda's fingerprints on Dean's friendly overtures.

"Cool women, loose dudes?" Dean suggested when Sam didn't respond.

It occurred to him to wonder how Dean Winchester had lived so long. He chose to ignore the comment. The more important issue was that, if Dean was going out, Sam wouldn't be able to watch both Dean and his mother.

"It's your first night back from college," he pointed out. "Don't you want to spend it with your family?"

"Thursday is Dad's poker night, and Mom goes out to book club. This isn't family home evening. Get your glad rags on, Sam. I'm taking you out to dinner." As he turned to leave the room he flicked his hand backwards and slapped Sam on the rump.

"Gmff!" _How had he lived so long?_


	6. Fire Part 2

He was playing with fire.

Dean knew that. He was taking liberties his close friends had learned to tolerate from him, but Sam hardly knew him, and he clearly didn't think Dean was funny (not even a little bit). He'd been forbearing so far (maybe too much so) but it wasn't as if the guy didn't have a snapping point. Dean had seen how close to it he'd come that morning and if Sam had been willing to go head to head with Dad, what would he make of Dean if push shoved? Matchsticks, probably. After all, Sam was a scary guy. Not that Dean was afraid of him, or that he needed to keep proving he wasn't to Sam, or maybe to himself, because that would be lame. It was just that Dean had always had a fascination with fire. The warmth of the flames had always drawn him closer and closer until he could find that point where it was just beginning to hurt, where it began to scorch his skin, the moment before it actually burned. And there was something so irresistibly enigmatic about the taciturn young man that Dean just couldn't help rattling the bars to find out what kind of beast was in the cage. He just hoped to god that when it opened he'd be ready for whatever walked out.

When Dean returned downstairs after showering and changing his father was just walking through the front door.

"Hey, Dean. Is your mother in?" he asked.

"No, she already went out. She left sandwiches for you."

"OK."

Sam emerged from the cloakroom washed and wearing a clean shirt, so Dean guessed their date was on. Why Sam hadn't told him to get jacked, he wasn't sure. Maybe Mom was right: he was on his own in a new town and he was lonely. Dean guessed, to put up with his shit, he'd have to be.

"Dad, Sam and I are going into town to eat. Can I take the keys to the truck?"

"Sam's got them."

Dean turned to Sam.

"Oh right, here." Sam fished hastily in his pocket and handed the keys to Dean who took them and turned toward the front door.

"See you later, Dad," he chirped. "Try to leave the other guys with their shirts tonight, huh?"

"Dean, wait a minute."

As Dean turned back his father reached into his own pocket and pulled out the keys to the Imapla. He tossed them in his palm a couple of times as if judging their weight then he looked up and glanced at Dean and Sam. As he did so he seemed to be arrested mid-thought and he looked from one to the other again. He had an odd expression on his face that Dean couldn't fathom, but then he appeared to remember that Dean was waiting for him.

"Give me those," he said, indicating the truck keys, and as Dean complied he held the keys to the Impala out in front of him.

Dean couldn't believe it. He hardly dared reach for them in case he was misunderstanding, but as Dad continued to dangle the keys in front of him he accepted that he truly was, finally, being trusted with the precious automobile. As his trembling fingers closed around them his father held on for just a second longer.

"_Don't _wreck it!" he admonished sternly.

"No, sir," Dean assured him then added "thanks, Dad." It came out in a hoarse whisper, and Dean turned away quickly to spare his father the inevitable overspill of emotion. He practically walked into Sam who was waiting right behind him, and he could have done without the look on Sam's face when he saw what was going on in Dean's eyes. Dean cursed whatever it was – weak tear ducts, an overbalance of estrogen, Moon and Venus in Pisces – whatever it was that made it so hard for him to hold back the waterworks when other men seemed to do it so naturally.

He felt ridiculously nervous as he approached the car. He hadn't felt this awkward since his first date with Nancy Weiner in ninth grade. He ran his hand gently over the roof before opening the door. "Not gonna hurt you, Babe," he breathed. Still he was convinced she was regarding him with derision and mistrust. Surely if she'd allowed Sam to drive her and escape unscathed she'd be at least as tolerant of Dean. He was _family_ after all . . . unless, _surely_ she'd forgiven him for sticking those lego bricks in the ventilation all those years ago. He was just a kid. True, you could still hear them rattling sometimes when the heater was on . . . and then there was the toy soldier stuck in the ashtray . . . but that was Sammy's fault. _Damn_. How many years had it been since he'd thought about Sammy? Of course, he'd used the name a couple of times recently . . .

He looked up at Sam to find him watching with a quizzical and, Dean thought, slightly mocking expression on his face. Dean noticed that, when Sam frowned, the corners of his eyebrows above his nose turned up in a rather exaggerated manner. It was kind of cute . . . Dean cleared his throat quietly, opened the door and slid purposefully into the driver's seat. He didn't want Sam to think he was afraid of the car. If he was sweating it was because it was an unusually warm evening for the time of year.

OK, so perhaps he was feeling just a little bit superstitious. It would be just his luck if, just because Dad had finally trusted him with the Impala, something stupid happened and he got the blame for it. There was no harm in being a little extra cautious. Though he thought he knew her like the back of his own hand, he still felt the need to familiarize himself with the layout from the new point of view. He closed his eyes as his fingers gently stroked then gripped the gear shift, and his other hand caressed the curve of the steering wheel –

Sam coughed. As Dean opened his eyes Sam flicked a finger between him and the dashboard.

"Do – er – do you two need to be alone?" he asked.

Dean raised his eyebrows and grinned broadly. So the young colt was starting to show some spirit as last!

Dean ran his hand lovingly over the Impala's dashboard. "Don't you listen to him, Babe," he cooed. "He doesn't understand us." With that, Dean took out his key and slid it smoothly into the ignition as he applied a firm but smooth pressure to the gas pedal. He felt a rush of exhilaration thrill through his body as the engine growled to life. Man, she had some power in her! As he took her out onto the road all his misgivings disappeared and he flashed a grin at his passenger.

_Nah._ This was meant to be, he could feel it. They were made for each other.


	7. Fire Part 3

Jack's Bar was still quiet when they arrived in town. Dean grabbed a couple of menus and led Sam to his favourite booth. Wendy, the waitress, spotted them almost immediately and was at Dean's side within moments.

"Hey, Dean! How are you? It's been ages!" she cried, treating Dean to a beaming smile.

"Too long, Wendy, too long." Dean grinned broadly back at her. "How have you been?"

Wendy rattled off some complaints about her family and a couple of guys she'd dated and ditched since the last time Dean had seen her, added some general gossip about the town and its residents before asking Dean about college. He responded with the highlights of the past semester, neglecting to mention his suspension.

"And how's it going with your girlfriend?" she asked, her smile less sincere as she made the enquiry than it had been formerly.

"Couldn't be better, Wendy," Dean assured her, then added "Have you met Sam? He's new in town. Dad and Stan are grooming him to be the next partner at Winchester & Copes."

Sam's eyes widened in alarm and he stiffened as is if someone had just stuck something cold up somewhere sensitive, but he managed to twitch his lips into a tight, awkward, 'blink and you'll miss it' smile as Wendy turned and gave him a cursory appraisal. "Hi, Sam," she said, and Sam responded with a brief nod.

"He's the strong silent type," Dean explained, and Wendy smiled at Sam again, but without enthusiasm. "So what can I get for you boys?" she asked, turning her attention to Dean once more. "The usual, Dean?"

"Yeah – ah . . . no. I'll have a diet coke. I'm driving," he explained as Wendy raised her eyebrows.

"OK." She still looked surprised. "And for you Sam?"

Sam cleared his throat and ordered a Budweiser, and Wendy sauntered away with a wiggle that Dean was happy to admire as she doubtless intended him to.

"F.Y. I. Sam, the strong silent routine isn't as big a hit with the ladies as slush novels would have you believe," Dean explained helpfully. "You know, what they really go for is a guy with a sense of humour. You really need to work on that."

Sam glared and his lips pruned into an expression of disapproval that, in time, Dean would come to think of as Sam's bitch-face, but any response he might have made was forestalled when Dean was suddenly thumped on the shoulder from behind and a loud male voice proclaimed "Yo! Winch!"

A cheery faced red-headed man appeared round the side of the booth with his arm slung round a pert blonde and Dean introduced Sam to his friends Chad and Nicki. "What you doing here?" Chad demanded, dropping into the seat next to Sam and pulling Nicki down beside him. "Aren't you supposed to be at Folsom U. studying whatever it is this week?"

"Time off for good behaviour, Chad."

"Yeah? What happened to your face? Penny catch you wearing her underwear again?"

"What can I say? I can't resist pink silk." Dean caught the expression on Sam's face and hurriedly added "Kidding, Sam!" to prevent any possible confusion about the matter.

Wendy returned with their drinks and took their orders. Sam asked for a chicken salad and Dean wondered how the guy had ever grown to such impressive proportions on a diet of rabbit food, but then he recalled his father's comments that morning and it occurred to him that Sam had probably ordered the cheapest meal on the menu. Dean ordered his usual bacon cheeseburger with extra sides of fries and onion rings and asked for a plate of mixed breads for the table to share while they were waiting.

Sam had an odd smile on his face and Dean was curious to know what amused him.

"Just wondering why you ordered diet coke," he explained.

"You're drinking coke?" Chad exclaimed.

"I'm driving," Dean reiterated, but this time he took out the keys to the Impala and twirled them round his index finger.

"No!" Chad was aghast. "The old man finally let you drive the old crate?"

"Hey!" Dean pointed an imperious finger at him. "Respect! Or you won't ever get to ride in her."

"We gonna take a spin in her later?"

Dean gave a tight shake of his head. "We do not joy ride in the Impala."

Chad shook his head derisively. "Man, you're as bad as your dad. It's just a car!"

Dean's eyebrows shot into his hairline. "Say that again and you can go find your own booth!"

Chad leaned conspiratorially toward Sam. "Doesn't even have a CD player. His old man's still playing audio-tapes."

"I'm not kidding." The smile had dropped off Dean's face and the bantering tone had been replaced with the barest suggestion of a hard edge.

Chad held up his hands in a gesture of surrender. "Hey, man, don't get your panties in a bunch. I was just yanking your chain."

In the somewhat awkward pause that followed Dean noticed that Sam was watching him. It was hard to read the meaning of the slight crease between his eyebrows, whether it was surprise, curiosity or something more disparaging. Doubtless Dean's protective loyalty toward the car seemed odd to a stranger. He forced himself to relax and he shook his head with a smile. "Nobody appreciates a classic any more," he said sadly. Luckily Wendy arrived at that moment with the plateful of baked breads diffusing any lingering tension in the atmosphere. Chad dived into the plate with a greedy appetite that was balanced out by the fact that Nicki ate like a bird. Nevertheless, Dean was careful to make sure Sam got at least a fair share.

As the evening progressed they were joined by a few more of the local crowd. There tended to be some natural curiosity about the newcomer in their midst, and Sam was fine answering questions about work and how he'd met Dean, but he became uncomfortable if pressed too hard about where he came from or what he'd done in the past. Dean would readily have admitted to having some curiosity of his own about Sam's background but since it was so obviously a sore point he made an effort to change the subject whenever Sam looked uneasy and steered the conversation toward other topics. Unfortunately this inevitably led to Sam being left out of the conversation altogether after a while so Dean suggested a game of pool. Sam acknowledged he hadn't had much practice at the game, but he was an average to fair player and held his own in his team, and he pulled off a couple of lucky shots that earned him the general approval of the group. Dean was a better than fair player and, truth be told, he was probably playing more flamboyantly than usual, relishing the opportunity to show off to Sam with something he was actually good at.

The fries and onion rings disappeared pretty quickly when Dean offered them around but when they were gone he ordered buffalo wings as well. Sam accepted food offerings reluctantly but Dean kept sticking plates under his nose until he capitulated, and until Dean was satisfied that he'd eaten enough to keep a growing boy healthy and active.

As he waved the last wing in Sam's face Dean noticed that he seemed pre-occupied. He was looking down and chalking his cue, apparently with great concentration, and he accepted the wing inattentively. "Those guys behind you, Dean, eleven o'clock," he said quietly, without looking up, "Do you know them?"

Dean glanced round and noticed, for the first time, a pair of strangers seated at a table some feet away. They were watching the group at the pool table until they saw Dean look their way but then they returned to their own conversation and concentrated on drinking their beers.

"Nah. Haven't seen them before," said Dean. "They look like tourists. Why?"

Sam nibbled idly at the buffalo wing. "They've been watching you."

Dean's eyebrows hooked upwards. "Huh." He looked back at the strangers but they were engrossed in their conversation now. "So what d'you think's the attraction, Sam? My chiseled jaw or my firm buttocks?"

Sam glanced up at Dean through his soft fringe of lashes. "Don't think it's your body they're after."

"Hmmph." Dean tossed his head sideways. "Well, they're not my type anyway," he quipped, but he kept a discreet eye on the tourists after that. Once or twice he caught them glancing in his direction but it didn't seem excessive. He wondered if Sam was just being over sensitive. Maybe they were just waiting for the pool table to free up.

Chad and Nicki left after a couple of games, Rob and Emily soon after that. Once the party started breaking up some of the guys suggested heading out of town and going clubbing, but the mention of strippers brought a disapproving wrinkle to Sam's nose and Dean could imagine Penny's face if she knew about it so he made their excuses and the guys moved on without them.

Dean didn't feel ready to head home. He toyed with the idea of playing another game, though he and Sam were hardly an even match on the table. They could just go back to the booth and have some pie . . . As he was deliberating the two tourists approached the pool table and Dean supposed that settled the matter, but just as he turned to clear the way for them the nearest one hailed him.

"Hey, hot shot!" In spite of the challenging salutation the man's smile was affable enough and he was holding out a couple of beers. "My brother and I reckon we can beat you. Fancy a friendly?"

Dean glanced at Sam. Since he'd expressed reservations about this pair already Dean wondered how he'd respond to this overture, but now he appeared indifferent. "What do you think, Sam?" Dean asked. "Are we ready for a challenge?"

The corners of Sam's mouth shrugged down in a non-committal gesture, but he didn't seem unwilling so Dean accepted the beers and shook the newcomer's hand. He introduced himself as Rick and his brother was Kurt. Like Sam, Kurt appeared to be the quiet one of the pair. Rick did all the talking. The brothers were on a road trip touring the States and Rick chatted non-stop about their travels. He paid more attention to boasting about their visits to Hollywood and the Grand Canyon than he did to the game but Dean didn't mind. He was inclined to be talkative too. As it happened he'd taken a year out before college and done some touring himself, and was happy to regale everybody with tales of his trip round Europe. Rick was suitably impressed with the story of Dean's travels, though Dean acknowledged that he regretted not having seen more of his own country.

"Well, there's still time, buddy," Rick said. "Hey, Sam! Your go."

Sam's attention had started wandering toward the end of the game and his play had deteriorated a little as a consequence, though he and Dean were still in the lead. Dean suspected he was bored. After all, he'd spent most of the evening listening to other people's conversations without having much to contribute of his own. Dean determined to quit after this game and skip pie. Sam had work in the morning; he should probably take him home.

In the end Rick and Kurt won by a whisker and Dean was about to shake hands and bid them goodnight and best wishes for the rest of their road trip, but Rick was eager for another game.

"Tell you what, we'll give you best out of three," he insisted.

"Ah, Rick, another night we'd have loved to but Sam's gotta be up early – "

"You're not tired are you, Sam?"

Sam quickly straightened up from where he'd been leaning against a wall. "Hell, no!" he exclaimed, perhaps a little too eagerly. He had a slightly silly grin on his face and it crossed Dean's mind to wonder how much he'd had to drink that evening. He didn't think it had been that much but maybe Sam wasn't used to alcohol. Hell, maybe he'd been a Mormon or something. Maybe that's why he was so prissy and reluctant to talk about his past.

"Want to make it more interesting, Dean?" Rick persisted. "Fifty dollars says we can beat you again." He drew out his wallet and placed a note down on the edge of the pool table.

Dean started to get a bad feeling about this. He shook his head. "That's a little bit rich for my blood – "

"Oh, come on, pretty boy!" Rick laughed. "What have you got to spend your money on besides hair mousse? I thought you were the player round here!"

His tone was bantering but Dean knew when he was being goaded. He looked at Sam who was still wearing that silly smile. He seemed ready to play on and Dean didn't want to look like he was intimidated. He knew he could lift his game another notch or two, he just wasn't so sure about Sam.

Dean pinned a grin on his face and pulled out his own wallet. "You're funny," he told Rick. "Funny guy." And he placed his own fifty on top of Rick's.

"Make it a hundred!"

Dean snapped his head round to stare at Sam as he added a third note to the pile. "Sam, no!" But Rick was already matching Sam's counter.

"We can take `em, Dean," Sam insisted happily.

Dean pulled him away from the table and dropped his voice. "Sam, I don't know how well these guys really play," he hissed. "I think we're being hustled here!"

Sam gave Dean a benign, glassy eyed smile and patted his face. "I have faith in you," he assured him.

Dean felt a sinking sensation in the pit of his stomach. After the way he'd been straining the plastic that evening he could ill afford to throw away fifty dollars himself and now he had Sam counting on him, the guy who could barely stretch to a chicken salad! He passed a nervous hand over his mouth and turned back to the table where Rick was waiting for him to break. Behind him there was a noise of bottles falling over and Sam shouted "Jesus Christ!" loud enough for the whole bar to hear. Apparently he'd leaned against the corner of a table and tipped it over and now he was clumsily trying to sop up spilled beer with paper napkins.

"'S ok. I'm all right."

"Son of a bitch," Dean breathed. "Sam, ask Wendy for a cloth."

"Right, right, will do," Sam agreed, wiping his hands on a sodden napkin. "Sorry guys. Don't worry. I'll get us another round in. Same again, everyone?"

Dean gritted his teeth. Another time drunk Sam might be fun. He was certainly a lot more relaxed. But right now he was a freakin' liability. "Just coke for me, Sam." As he picked up his cue he noticed the jeering expression on Rick's face. "I'm _driving_," he growled.

Sam walked a little unevenly over to the bar where Wendy was just finishing serving another customer.

"Sorry, I had a little accident over there," he told her.

"Yeah, I saw. Don't worry, Sam. I'll take care of it." She made a move toward the pool table but Sam caught her arm and held her back.

"Would you mind getting me three beers, first," he asked. "And a coke and an empty glass, and a glass of water if that's ok."

Wendy served the drinks and glass on a tray for him, then picked up a cloth and went to clean up the mess he'd left by the pool table. Sam glanced back at the tourists. They weren't paying any attention to him but were concentrating on needling Dean now. Since their only reaction when he'd called on the name of Christ was to laugh at his clumsiness he was reasonably confident they weren't demons: just a couple of low rent hustlers who thought they'd spotted a fool and his money.

As relentlessly annoying as Dean could be Sam had decided that, on balance, he was a fundamentally decent guy. He had his father's open friendliness and generosity, he was good humoured on the whole, loyal and protective of his family Sam had noticed, and it hadn't escaped Sam's attention how carefully Dean had protected him from his friends' curiosity all night. If he could just lose the ego and the attitude for five minutes he might even be likeable. The trouble was Dean had been telegraphing his ego and, unfortunately, his generosity to the whole bar all evening. That's why these low-lifes had decided he was an easy mark. Well, they were wrong. He wasn't. Not tonight.

Sam picked up his beer and poured about three quarters of it into the empty glass, then topped up the bottle with water. Replacing his bottle on the tray he left the glasses behind on the bar and carried the tray with exaggerated carefulness back to the pool table. Setting it down he picked up and took a long pull on his beer.

"Easy, Tiger," Dean hissed edgily, grasping Sam's arm and pulling it down from his mouth. "I need you sharp."

"Don't worry, Dean," Sam assured him airily, "I play better when I've had a drink."

Dean had made good progress on the table. Now he was giving the game his full attention he was a very good player, but Rick was better and when Dean just missed a difficult shot Rick was ready to take advantage. He started picking off balls with smug expertise and for a while it looked like it might be a very short game, but then he got over confident and bungled a shot and now it was Sam's turn.

Sam deliberated how to play it. He had been studying these guys very carefully throughout the previous game. Kurt was the more consistent player of the two but Rick was the brains, the leader and the ego of the pair and Sam was confident Kurt wasn't an issue. He would follow his brother's lead. Rick was at least as cocky and smart-ass as Dean without any of Dean's endearing qualities, and Sam had noticed he'd been less than pleased that his road-trip boasts had been trumped by Dean's European tour. Sam was aware if he played the long game he was risking Dean's money as well as his own, but he was sure Rick would be greedy and would grasp an opportunity to hurt and humiliate if it was offered to him.

Sam elected to overplay an apparently easy shot. The ball whizzed across the table, wiped its feet on the edges of the pocket and stayed on the lip. Sam grinned apologetically at Dean. "Oops," he said, and Dean restrained a groan of exasperation. It was hard on him being left out of the loop, but his genuine anxiety was really helping to sell the play and, truth be told, Sam was enjoying a little payback for Dean having ridden him constantly since they'd met. Sam wasn't stupid, though. He'd left the table safe, and all Kurt could do was play a safety shot in return, then it was Dean's turn again.

He circled the table looking for the best angle and found a shot that was possible, though it wasn't easy. He had to use two cushions to make it, but his aim was sure. For a moment it looked like it might not have enough legs, and Sam could see Dean was holding his breath as the ball trickled toward the pocket, but after hanging on the edge for a microsecond that felt like an eternity it dropped in and Sam whistled and applauded noisily. "Go, Dean!" he yelled, tossing Rick an arrogant and provocative leer. The next shot wasn't easy either but Dean made it, and after that he hit his stride again and Sam began to wonder if he might pull off a win after all. But when it came down to one ball Dean was sweating visibly and as he leant over the table there was a tell-tale tremble in his arm, and Sam started to feel bad about putting him under so much pressure. As he drew back his arm to take the shot his hand shook. He miscued, froze for a moment, then his head drooped. Rick had two balls left on the table and a free shot. It was all over and everyone knew it. As Dean turned from the table he looked gutted. "I'm sorry, Sam," he murmured huskily, as if it was all his fault, and suddenly it wasn't fun any more.

Rick cleared the table with a flourish and picked up his winnings. "Thanks for the game, guys," he said with an insolent tone and extended his hand, and when Dean shook it half-heartedly he added, "Guess you're just not the hotshot you thought you were, hey, Dean?"

Dean's face darkened with anger and Sam worried he might blow it, but he didn't bite. He started to walk away from the table but Sam lingered.

"You've gotta give us a chance to win our money back," Sam yelped.

Rick just laughed dismissively and Dean tugged at Sam's arm.

"Forget it, Sam. We've been hustled," he said bitterly. "It's over. Let's go."

Sam roughly shook Dean's hand away, making the transition from happy drunk to angry drunk and fishing awkwardly in his wallet. "Double or nothing!" he challenged.

"Sam, no!" Dean tried to pull him away from the table but Sam shook him off again.

It was a fair offer. If Rick didn't get greedy, Sam was giving him the chance to walk away even, but it was there in his eyes. He was greedy. "Don't think your boyfriend's interested, Sam," he leered. "And you ain't got what it takes."

Sam's nostrils flared. _Right._ The asshole deserved all he got. Sam lurched toward the table and slammed the rest of the advance John had given him down on the edge. "Three hundred dollars!" he snarled. "It's all I've got. Just you and me, you fucking scum sucking, low life loser!"

Dean tried to make a grab for Sam's money and put himself bodily between him and Rick. "That's it, Sam! We're going home now. Sam!"

Sam pushed him roughly away. "Stay out of this, Dean. This is between me and him!"

"Yeah, that's right, Dean," Rick agreed jeeringly as he matched Sam's bet. "Sam's a big boy. He can make his own decisions."

"He's fucking drunk, you asshole!"

"He's put his money down; I've matched it. It's too late."

"You son of a bitch!"

Dean made a lunge at Rick and Sam was surprised how much of his strength it took to hold him back. He needed to calm the situation quickly. Wendy was starting to turn worried glances in their direction. Draping his arms round Dean's neck and shoulders he sought to gain his attention without Rick seeing. "It's ok, Dean! It's ok! I told you, I play better when I've had a drink."

As Dean tried to disentangle himself from Sam's inappropriate embraces he looked up and Sam held him with a steady and meaningful look. Dean cocked his head questioningly to one side and Sam winked at him. Dean's eyes widened for a moment then he stepped back. He still looked doubtful but he was ready to back Sam's play. "Whatever!" he snapped. "I'm not your keeper," and he dropped irritably into the nearest chair.

Sam kept up his drunk act just a moment longer for Rick's benefit, then he picked up his cue, placed the cue ball and sent it smartly into the edge of the pack dropping two balls with his first shot. As he started smoothly picking the rest off one by one he cast a slightly anxious, slightly apologetic grin at Dean.

Dean's eyes were wide, his lips parted in a silent astonished "oo" and Sam felt a curious wave of something like affection for him. Then Dean threw back his head and indulged in a long, unrestrained peal of laughter. He picked up his coke, drank long and settled back to enjoy the show. Rick and Kurt's mouths were open too, and their expressions were murderous. _Now_ Sam was enjoying himself.

It was a short game and when it was over Sam extended his hand to Rick and Kurt but he had no real expectation that they would accept their defeat gracefully, and he was right.

"You son of a bitch!" Rick spat. "You played us for suckers!"

Sam's lips pursed into their characteristic downward shrug. "I guess the game's only fun if you win, huh?" he suggested.

Rick made a grab for the money but Sam's powerful grip closed around his wrist and he winced in pain as his arm folded back.

"Back off," Sam told him. His voice was low but filled with quiet menace. "You played the wrong mark. Those are the breaks. Now get out of here."

Dean was on his feet. Sam could feel him just behind his shoulder. Then a new voice interrupted.

"Is there a problem here, boys?" A rugged looking man almost Sam's height and built like a brick proverbial appeared behind Dean.

"No, Jack, I don't think so," Dean answered, evenly. "Our friends were just leaving. Right?"

Sam released Rick's arm and the brothers backed towards the door.

"This isn't over!" Rick shot back before they left.

"It is if you're smart," Sam warned.

Jack dropped a gently restraining hand on Sam's shoulder as the hustlers disappeared out of the door. "Ok, son, cool off now," he said.

Sam noted the direction the brothers had taken then turned and nodded politely at the bar owner. "It's ok, I'm good," he assured him.

"Sorry, Jack, we didn't mean for there to be any trouble," Dean apologized. "Sam and I are leaving now, too. Ok, Sam?"

Sam nodded agreement and collected his jacket from their booth. As Dean made to leave he caught his attention and gestured toward the other door, on the other side of the bar to the one the hustlers had left through. Dean nodded and Sam followed him outside. As they left Dean started laughing again. "Man, you're a dark horse you sneaky son of a bitch! You really had me going back there! Have you ever considered a career on the stage?"

Sam was still keeping his eye out for the hustlers as they made their way across the street, he wasn't convinced they'd let the matter drop, but he allowed himself a slightly self-satisfied grin. He rolled his tongue against the inside of his cheek. "Nah. I hear TV's where the real money's to be made," he quipped, and he was rewarded with a broad and delighted grin in return from Dean.

"Well, if it comes to that, with your skills you could be making a shit-load of money in the pool halls!" Dean suggested. "You're a natural."

Sam frowned and shook his head. "I don't want to make money that way. Not any more. The only reason I did it tonight was because those guys pissed me off."

Dean paused and gazed at Sam appraisingly for a moment. "Ok, Sam, so it's clear you've got quite a story behind you, and if you don't want to tell me about it that's cool. I won't push. But just so you know, if you ever do feel like sharing any of it, you've officially got my attention."

Sam felt a little awkward. He did feel he owed Dean some kind of explanation, but where would he even start? He shrugged and stared off into the distance for a moment. "It's complicated," he said.

"Yeah, I'm getting that," Dean acknowledged.

Then Sam heard it: the soft scrape of a foot, and the barest movement in the shadows confirmed his worst suspicions. "Dean!" he yelled, grabbing him and hauling him back out of harm's way just as Kurt appeared brandishing a knife. It took Sam a moment to block his lunge and grab his wrist. There was a sickening snap of bone and Kurt shrieked and dropped the knife. Sam kicked it out of the way. Rick wasn't far behind Kurt but a swift kick to the knee-cap dropped him to the floor as well. Kurt was clutching his injured arm and whimpering.

"Take your brother and walk away," Sam told him. "While you can still walk."

Kurt's lip curled back in anger but he backed off. He lifted Rick's arm over his shoulder and the brothers limped off down the street. Sam watched until they'd receded well into the distance, then he glanced at Dean who was backed up against the wall where Sam had pushed him, looking stunned. He saw Sam looking at him and cleared his throat.

He swallowed and laughed uneasily. "Right, well, just let me know when you need back up, Sam, and I'll be right there!"

Sam picked up the knife, closed it and slipped it into his jacket pocket. "I don't think they'll bother us again," he said.

Dean was looking at Sam rather oddly as he moved to walk beside him. "Sam, you are mad, bad and dangerous to know," he breathed. Sam glanced at Dean's face. The remark didn't appear to be a criticism, and it lacked any of Dean's usual mocking tone. After a moment Dean laughed, still a little nervously but laced with something like excitement. "Man, you were _awesome_!"

Sam wasn't expecting any more trouble but he was relieved when they made it back to the Impala without further incident. Dean shivered as he fumbled for his keys.

"Is it me, or has it gotten really cold?" Sure enough their breath was coming out in a chilly mist. "I should have brought my jacket, but I didn't think I'd need it. It was really warm earlier."

Sam began to feel uneasy. He wanted to get back and check on Amanda. "We should get back to the house," he urged.

As they climbed into the car he handed Dean his share of the pot.

"No, you keep it, Sam. You won it."

"You played your part." Sam insisted.

Dean surveyed him levelly for a few moments and nodded. "Yeah, and my part was to watch you and wet myself, wasn't it? You might have let me know what you were doing, you know."

Sam hesitated. He'd been expecting this sooner or later, but now that it had come up he felt defensive. "It was more convincing if - "

"If I was sweating my balls off. Yeah. I get it." Dean's eyes were dark and serious. "Don't ever play me like that again, Sam."  
>Sam rankled a little at Dean's tone. <em>Or what?<em> he was tempted to retort. _You'll beat me up? Yeah, right. You won't be my friend?_

The bubble of Sam's arrogance burst into air as he realized that the latter was _exactly _what Dean meant. Friendship was being extended here, right along with the threat of its withdrawal. Dean was making it clear that he was offering something of value, and it wasn't to be fucked with.

Sam swallowed and nodded. "Sure," he replied, a little hoarsely. "You got it."


	8. Fire Part 4

Sam was relieved to find that everything appeared normal back at the house. Amanda was making herself a hot chocolate and preparing for bed when they arrived. John hadn't come home from his poker game yet, but neither Dean nor Amanda appeared unduly concerned about that.

Dean began recounting the events of the evening to his mother, leaving out the incident involving the hustlers and concentrating on the news and gossip of his friends instead. He reached into the refrigerator and pulled out a couple of beers. As he handed one to Sam he gave him a cheery grin and a wink, and Sam suddenly felt a painfully acute pang of anxiety. If anything should happen to Dean . . .

Sam used a visit to the bathroom as an opportunity to check upstairs, but a search of Dean's room and Amanda's revealed nothing unusual. In some ways, waiting for something to happen was the worst of it. Fighting monsters was – well, not easy, but straightforward. You did what you had to. There wasn't time to think or worry when you were in the middle of a fight. But here he was, standing at ground zero, watching the demon omens gather and just _waiting_ for the events of his dream to start playing out and all the time getting more and more attached to . . . its subjects. Part of him wanted the wait to be over, if only he could be certain there was anything he could do to stop it all happening just the way he'd dreamt it. But this was no ordinary monster he was dealing with. He wasn't even sure it was an ordinary demon. If fifty words of Latin were all he needed to save Dean's life then why was Sam's mother dead?

He descended the stairs and Amanda wished him goodnight as they crossed in the hallway.

"Ah, Amanda - ?"

She turned and waited for him to finish his sentence but he didn't know what he was going to say. "Um . . . if you need anything . . . if . . . We'll be just down here. Just call . . ."

She smiled and frowned at the same time. "Sure, Sam," she replied, puzzled. "Goodnight."

He watched her go upstairs and felt the muscles on his forehead tightening and creasing as she reached the landing and disappeared.

When he returned to the living room he found Dean stretched out on the couch. He had his guitar laid across his stomach and was strumming quietly and crooning lines from the song he'd been playing earlier that day.

" . . . knocking at my door  
>in the middle of the night. What you want me for?<br>Why do you walk into my – "

He glanced up as Sam picked up his beer from the coffee table and dropped into an armchair.

" . . . ah . . . do deedoo deedoo.  
>Ra tatata tum tum tat a ta."<p>

"Needs work," Sam commented with a smile.

"Yeah. It isn't finished."

The soft lamplight glistened in Dean's eyes, picked out the curl of those ridiculously long lashes and accentuated the curves of his plump lips. Sam's gaze traveled down the length of Dean's body and he couldn't help thinking about the previous evening when he'd seen him half naked . . . well, completely naked in the end. _Oh, no! _He _definitely_ didn't want to think about _that_ – or what he'd heard during that excruciating hour he'd spent behind the couch . . .

He took a long swallow from his beer and cleared his throat. "So, you're a music major?" he asked, desperately making conversation in an effort to derail his thoughts.

"I am now." Dean was still strumming quietly. Sam watched his fingers playing sensuously across the strings –

"You weren't before?"

"I've had a few educational fiascos," Dean conceded. "It's gonna work out this time, though. Music feels right for me."

"So why didn't you do that in the first place?"

"Ah!" Dean sighed and grimaced. He stopped playing for a moment and passed a hand round the back of his neck. "Ah, you know how it is, Sam. You do what you think the folks want, what you think'll make them proud of you, and you just wind up . . . I dunno. I guess I figured if I couldn't be a typical macho jock I'd at least try and be smart . . ." Dean laughed and crooked his eyebrows at Sam. "But I guess I'm what you'd call the 'sensitive creative' type."

Sam laughed. "And is that a problem?"

"You mean apart from the fact that I think my Dad thinks I'm probably gay? . . . Not that there's anything wrong with that."

Sam paused midway through lifting his beer to his mouth. He wondered if he was starting to be a little affected by the alcohol he'd consumed that evening . . . because he didn't think he'd normally ask the question he knew he was just about to ask . . .

"And are you?"

Dean's eyebrows shot up, whether from the question or just the fact that Sam had asked it was open to debate.

"No!" Dean laughed. "No, it's just that . . . well, you know what it's like. Dad was born and raised in Smallville, USA, and whether he admits it or not he still kinda thinks if I use mousse and write poetry I've gotta be a bit gay."

"You write poetry?"

"Lyrics. I'm a musician. And that's actually made me pretty popular with women. In case you hadn't noticed, Sam, I have a steady girlfriend."

It occurred to Sam that Dean did protest a little too much and he couldn't resist poking him a little further.

"Doesn't necessarily mean anything," he said, pursing his lips just a tad dismissively.

Dean put down his guitar, sat up and leaned forward. The assertive stance he was doubtless aiming for was somewhat compromised by the lamplight emphasizing the beauty of his eyes and face. "Listen, Sam, if I were gay I wouldn't have a problem acknowledging it," he insisted. "I have gay friends at college, and there's a couple of the guys here I'm not sure about but they're probably afraid to come out. There's an element round here that thinks anyone who's 'different' is some kind of freak or monster. Well, they need to get themselves an education."

Sam didn't respond straight away. He was a little irritated by Dean's last remark. He'd met college guys before who'd gone away and had their heads filled with other people's ideas and come back thinking that made them better than everyone around them, including the parents who'd worked hard to send them to college in the first place. The reality was that Dean Winchester didn't know what an education _was_ . . .

Sam envied him that.

Still there was some mischievous devil inside Sam that tempted him to test Dean's liberality a little further. He took another mouthful of beer. "Ever tried it?" he asked, casually. Oh, he had _definitely_ had too much to drink.

Dean's eyebrows hooked upwards once more and he stretched his head forward a little. "With a man you mean? . . . No!"

It occurred to Sam that, by now, Dean must be wondering why Sam was so interested in his sexuality.

As if to confirm his thoughts Dean asked "Have you?"

Sam twirled his bottle in his fingers, swilling the beer around in the bottom. "Once." He took another swig. "A male hooker came on to me one time. I was curious so I thought 'what the hell?'."

In spite of his 'education' Sam could see that Dean was shocked. His eyes were wide and his lips pursed into that cherubic 'oo' once more. Sam was surprised at how tempted he was to just reach over and plant one on them right there and then. Was it the alcohol, he wondered, or was Dean Winchester himself the intoxicant that was fuzzing his senses and clouding his judgment.

Dean laughed and shook his head. "Ah, Sammy, Sammy, Sammy, you are seriously not as sweet `n innocent as you look, are you?"

"My name's Sam, Dean."

"Yeah, of course. Sorry . . . so . . . er . . ." Dean leaned back and took a quick pull from his own beer. "What was it like?"

Sam suppressed the smile that played at the corner of his lips. He shrugged. "It was ok."

"But . . . you prefer women?" Dean suggested, trying but not altogether succeeding to make the question sound rhetorical.

Sam frowned and shrugged again. It took him a few moments to answer, and then he said "actually I can't honestly say I'm that bothered either way. I think the whole thing's over-rated."

Dean's mouth dropped open. He looked even more shocked and astonished than he had at Sam's first confession. "What . . . sex, you mean? You're kidding, right?"

Sam shook his head. "I could never really see what the fuss was all about."

Dean laughed outright. "Dude! . . . Seriously, Sam, if you think that then you're doing it wrong!"

Sam looked up from his beer, their eyes met and there was a strange, Sam felt, shared moment that stirred something inside him and made his chest ache with a gasp that seemed to be trapped there, and a voice in his head whispered "_show me!"._

_No. _This had gone too far. Sam needed to put a stop to this line of conversation right now. "We should go to bed," he said, and immediately regretted his choice of words as Dean's eyebrows shot up.

"Excuse me?"

"No! That wasn't – " Sam could feel his cheeks growing hot with blushing. "I didn't mean – I just meant – It's late. We should – "

But Dean was laughing again. "Ah, Sam! Your face! You're priceless. You really are."

Sam scowled. How _had_ he lived so long?

"You're right. It is late, and you've got work tomorrow," Dean acknowledged, checking his watch. "Where the hell has Dad got to? He should be home by now." He stood up. "I'm just gonna make myself a bit of supper. You want some?"

Sam stood too. "Seriously? You're still hungry? Do you ever stop eating?"

"I'm just gonna have a jelly sandwich. I missed out on pie at the bar."

Sam shook his head. He didn't know where Dean put it all. He didn't deserve his male-model body . . . and _seriously_, Sam needed to stop thinking about him that way. It was stupid. It was pointless. It was dangerous and it was unprofessional. He made his way to the den and sat down on the cot, dropping his head into his hands and drawing his fingers down his face. He spent a few minutes just trying to clear his head. Of all the times to start developing his first man-crush, this wasn't it. He stood up and turned out the room's main light, starting to unbutton his shirt as he made his way back to the bed. He reached out and switched on the bedside lamp. As he withdrew his fingers the light flickered on and off with a sinister fizzing noise and Sam's whole body turned cold as suddenly as if it had been snap frozen.

_Sandwich! _

"DEAN!" He spun round and flew out of the room.

. . . . .

Dean was humming as he reached the top of the stairs.

"There's a crossroads coming in your life," he sang to himself.  
>"And your fate's gonna turn on the point of a knife.<br>"He sang 'Hey, brother, come away with me.  
>"Let me take you, let me show you how it's gotta be'!"<p>

Dean frowned a little. It hadn't occurred to him when he'd first written it but, in the light of the recent conversation, Dean wondered if there was something vaguely homoerotic sounding about those last lines.

He was raising the sandwich to his mouth as he reached his bedroom door. Pausing before opening it he glanced down the hall to the end of the passage where light streamed through the partially open door of his mother's bedroom. He was surprised that she was still up.

"Night, Mom!" he called.

He took a bite of his sandwich and turned the handle of his own door, then paused again. "Mom?" he called again through half chewed bread. Some instinct, some sense of unease, drew him down the passage toward the open door.

"Mom?" he repeated, a little louder, a little more insistently.

The room appeared empty when he entered it and a puzzled frown settled on his face. Then something wet splashed on his forehead. He wiped the drip from his brow and stared for a moment at the blood red stain on his fingers then his eyes flicked to the ceiling. There was a moment of dull incomprehension before they widened with horror and he uttered a strangled scream. "Mom!"

He had the briefest glimpse of her blood-soaked body pinned to the ceiling before a wash of yellow flames blazed from the centre, engulfing her, and he felt a sudden violent tug on his shirt collar as he was hauled backwards through the door.

He didn't know what it was. He didn't care. He only knew he had to get back in the room and get his mother out of it, save her from the flames, the heat – but there was something in his way now, some huge monstrous form blocking his passage. He beat at it and thrust his foot against a wall to force it out of his way.

"Dean! You can't help her! You can't save her! She's gone!" _Sam's voice._

Still he pushed, he rammed, he fought. Then Sam's face was right in front of him, jaw hard and determined, head framed by a halo of smoke and flame. Then there was nothing but black oblivion. Dean never even saw the punch that knocked him out.

Sam moved frantically to lift Dean's inert body as the heat in the corridor increased and the acrid smells of smoke, blood and charred flesh mingled with the bad-egg stink of sulphur. He felt rather than saw a shadow cross in front of him, and when he looked up he felt stunned and confused.

"John!"

John's face grinned malevolently down at him, and despite the heat from the crackling flames behind him, Sam felt utterly chilled.

"Guess again." And as he spoke the dark eyes turned yellow. "Little Sammy, my how you've grown! You won't remember, but we've met before. I knew your mother well."

Hot rage replaced cold and fear and animated Sam's limbs. He lunged recklessly at the demon, but in an instant he was lifted bodily from the floor by some invisible force and slammed back against the wall. The breath was driven from his lungs and he flailed his limbs helplessly.

"Gotta say I just love what you've done with the place. I'm impressed. I can see you've done your best," the demon sneered, "and I want you to know it was a great effort, honestly. It would have kept out the rank and file. But I'm a little above your pay grade. You don't know enough to take me on, son. You're not strong enough. Not yet."

Sam gasped in a lungful of air and started reciting: "Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus – "

It was as if a rope had tightened around his throat. The words died in his mouth as he gasped for air. He could feel his windpipe being crushed.

"You can't save them, Sammy. It's too late. It was too late before you were born."

John's massive frame moved in front of him and Sam stared helplessly down into the leering features and pus-coloured eyes. "Amanda's dead," he pronounced with gleeful satisfaction. "Dean's as good as dead. I have John Winchester, and pretty soon I'll have his son as well."

The crushing pain in Sam's throat increased. His mouth opened and closed like a beached fish as he struggled for air, but just as he began to lose consciousness the grip relaxed and he dropped in a heap to the floor. John was leaning spread across the opposite wall, panting. "Get Dean!" he gasped. "Take him outside as fast as you can!"

Sam stared for a moment then crawled over to Dean's body and stumbled to his feet.

"Hurry, Sam," John croaked. "I can't hold him back much longer."

Starved for oxygen and faint from the heat Sam found one last reserve of strength and hauled Dean over his shoulder. Torn and trembling he shot a despairing glance back at John. _Fifty words of latin . . .?_

"Now, Sam! Go!"

There wasn't time. He plunged down the stairs and through the front door with Dean over his shoulder and until they were outside he never looked back. He crossed the street and lowered Dean onto the lawn of the opposing property before turning back to gaze at the house. He caught a glimpse of John's silhouette dark against the flames that were engulfing the upper level. He must have imagined he could see the leer and the glow of the eyes before he vanished.

There were people gathering in the street now. Someone must have called 911; he could hear sirens in the distance. As he turned to gaze down at Dean he saw his eyelids flutter, and the next moment the young man was back on his feet and Sam had to use every ounce of his remaining strength to hold him back from running into the burning building.

"It's too late, Dean!" he cried. "She's gone! I'm sorry. I couldn't save her. I'm so sorry. I'm so, so sorry."

At last the fight seemed to go out of Dean and he just stood there in Sam's arms, seemingly as inert as when he'd been unconscious. Sam turned and looked at him, at the dance of the flames reflected in his stunned, bewildered eyes, and at the pallor of shock in the too, too beautiful face. And Sam had to wonder, if he hadn't been so pre-occupied with those features and the young man whom they graced, would Amanda Winchester still be alive . . . ?

.

NEXT CHAPTER COMING SOON:

THE NEVER ENDING ROAD.


	9. The Never Ending Road Prologue

Chapter 4: The Never Ending Road

_Castor's Passage, California_

The silence in the car was tense and chilled. Neither of them had spoken for several minutes. There were tears standing in the woman's eyes and at length she turned to her husband a face that was at once stony and angry, yet pleading.

"Aren't you going to say anything?" she demanded.

"I don't know what you want me to say," he sighed. "I've told you I'm sorry."

"Sorry isn't enough!"

"I can't keep having this conversation! I told you, she didn't mean anything to me."

"Well, while it was going on _I_ didn't mean anything to you, did I?"

When he answered her with more silence she turned her face toward the passenger window and stared at her own trembling lips reflected in the darkness beyond the glass. Slowly and mechanically her gaze gravitated toward the front of the car where the broken white lines disappeared under the far edge of the hood. Soon she was mesmerized by the repetitive, unchanging rhythm. She began to trace the lines back to where they stretched into the distance, into the unkown, unforgiving and inescapable future. Anxiety and fear began to constrict her chest as she stared at that distant point. She was suddenly possessed by the conviction that the road had no end, that she was being driven inexorably into the darkness of the eternal abyss. Even as the thought took shape she exhaled a breath that spilled from her lips in a frosted cloud.

Her husband spoke again and, at first, his oddly flat statements seemed to echo her own thoughts, but then they quickly ceased to make any sense at all.

"We've been on this road forever, and it was always leading us here. Whatever we did, whatever we tried to do, it was always going to come to this. This thing between us, these feelings . . . they're cursed, damned. They've made monsters of us both. There's only one way this can end."

She stared at him blankly. "What? What are you – ?"

Suddenly he floored the gas pedal and the car leapt forward.

"Wait! Stop!" But her words froze in her mouth as her attention snapped to the road ahead, at the moment that it vanished beneath them . . .

Then they were falling and falling, and she was screaming, but her cries were cut short by the sounds of shattering glass and grinding metal then the long, mournful wail of the horn . . . . .


	10. The Never Ending Road Scene 1

Dean stumbled mechanically down the steps from the police station. When he saw the Impala parked in the road outside it briefly raised him from his stupor. Running forward, he snatched open the passenger door. "Dad!" he cried, his heart thumping. But it wasn't his father in the driver's seat, and the crushing disappointment came out of him in the form of irrational anger. "What the fuck are you doing here?" he demanded.

"Dean, get in the car."

He blinked for a moment then obeyed automatically. The tone of authority in Sam's voice was so uncannily like Dad's it seemed natural to do as he was told. And, truthfully, it was a relief to have someone telling him what to do because Dean didn't have a clue. About anything. At all.

Sam didn't say anything. He didn't ask questions. He didn't offer condolences. He just gunned the engine, steered the car out into the road and drove. That was a relief as well. Talking was too hard. Thinking was hard. Everything was hard . . . and too bright. Dean leaned back against the head rest and closed his eyes against the glare of a world grown suddenly menacing and strange, but as his eyelids dropped it was as if the flames and the blood and the death mask of his mother's face were imprinted on the back of them, and he was instantly upright and staring ahead of him, though nothing that was before his eyes made any impression on him.

Then his cell phone buzzed. The vibration in his pocket goaded him like a cattle prod against exposed nerves. He reached into his pocket as an automaton and winced as he read the name on the screen. Chad.

_No. Go away._

He waited until the call diverted to his voicemail then checked his missed calls. There were seventeen. One from Chad, one from Emily, one from Jimmy, a number he didn't recognize, one from Stan . . . he should answer that . . . but not just now . . . one from Wendy, eleven from Penny. Why did she do that? Did she think he hadn't got the first ten?

Even as he held the phone in his hand it buzzed once more, and he winced again.

_Leave me alone._

It was Penny again. His thumb hovered irresolutely over the answer button then punched down grimly. Gritting his teeth, he held the phone to his ear.

"Dean! Thank god! Are you ok?" _ No. I'm not ok. _ "I've been so worried about you. I've been trying to reach you for ages."

"I'm ok," he assured her, shaking his head. "I've been talking to the police."

There was a brief silence at the other end of the line, then she asked "Do they have any idea what happened?"

Dean shook his head then remembered she couldn't see him. "They don't have a clue. They're saying accident. It wasn't an accident, Pen. What I saw – " but he didn't want to talk about what he saw again. It was insane and people didn't believe him, anyway. They thought he was insane. Maybe he was. He wished he was. "I don't think they believe it, either. They keep asking me about Dad, but I don't know where he is, Pen! And I'm worried sick about him but, because he's gone missing, I think they suspect . . . It's sick. They don't know what happened so they just . . . If Sam hadn't been there they'd probably suspect me as well."

"Dean, as soon as I can get away here I'll get the next available flight – "

"No, don't do that."

"I want to be there for you – "

"There's nowhere for you to stay – "

"So, we'll get a motel."

Then he'd have to talk, he'd have to think about her, worry about her. "Look, just wait a bit, would you please, Babe? Just 'til I know what I'm doing, ok?"

There was a pause. "I just want to be there for you, Dean."

"I know. And I appreciate it, Babe. I really do, but it's just . . . right now . . ." _Leave me alone just now. Please just leave me alone. _"Listen, I can't talk right now. Can I call you back?"

"Dean, I just – "

"I'll call you back later, ok?"

"Dean – "

"I'll call you back." He closed the phone and for a few moments he held it pressed against his forehead then he turned it off and threw it into the back.

After a brief period of silence Sam asked "Have you eaten? Shall I call in at a diner?"

"I'm not hungry," Dean replied hoarsely.

Sam nodded and didn't speak again.

Dean was glad to be relieved of the effort of making conversation, but even the silence that replaced it was invasive. His own thoughts – mere images and noise, but violent and horrid – assaulted and tormented him. He reached forward and turned on the radio. Even the inane chatter of the radio jock was an irritation he couldn't cope with at that moment, but it was cut off when he pushed the cassette into the slot. AC/DC blasted out of the speakers, and he turned up the volume until it was far too loud, but it drowned out the white noise in his head. The familiar chords and lyrics came loaded with their own unique baggage of association and exquisite pain but that, at least, was something he could focus on that made sense.

It hadn't occurred to him to ask Sam where they were going, yet he was vaguely surprised when they pulled into the driveway of a cheap motel on the outskirts of the town. What had he expected? It wasn't as if he could ever go home –

Sam parked in front of one of the ground level rooms and got out of the car. Dean heard the trunk open and close, then the passenger door opened and Sam stood beside it clutching a room key in one hand and holding a grocery bag in the other.

"Dean, come on."

Dean lifted himself out of the car and followed Sam into the room. He leaned against the dividing partition between the kitchenette and bedroom area, while Sam emptied the contents of the bag: milk, eggs, cocoa, fruit juice, other small unidentifiable packages, carton of salt . . .

As Dean watched he picked up the latter, walked over to the door with it and started pouring a white line in a semi-circle around the entrance. He poured a similar line along the window sills before disappearing into the bathroom, carton still in hand. _Salt round the entrances . . ._ That comforted Dean somehow. It reminded him of something from when he was a child. What was it? . . . Salt was lucky. It protected you from monsters.

Sam was protecting them from monsters.

_Good._

. . .

Dean frowned.

. . .

_What?_

. . .

Dean's focus began to pick out other objects that had been introduced into the room: Sam's back-pack on the bed nearest the door, a shotgun lying next to it, a jar of water with a crucifix in the bottom sitting on the nightstand, odd shells placed around it . . . Dean had a vague idea that these things should be worrying him . . .

Sam returned from the bathroom and put down the salt carton. Then he opened a cupboard, took out a plastic beaker, filled it with milk and started adding eggs and other items.

"Sam . . . what are we doing here?" Dean asked.

Sam walked over to the bed and rummaged in his backpack. He pulled out and opened a leather pouch that held a number of smaller pouches. "It's just temporary," he replied, "until we figure out what our next move is."

"Oh . . . ok."

Sam returned to the counter and poured some of the contents of a couple of the small pouches into the beaker.

Dean frowned again . . . _our next move _. . . ?

Sam was shaking the beaker vigorously now. Once satisfied the contents were mixed he took off the lid, added a straw and held it out to Dean. "Drink this," he said.

Dean gazed blankly at it for a moment. "What is it?"

"Basic protein shake."

"I'm not hungry."

"You need something, Dean. Just drink it."

Sam turned the straw around and pushed it close to Dean's mouth. He didn't have the will to argue. His lips closed over the straw and he took a sip. It was sweet and chocolaty tasting, and there was something oddly comforting about the action of sucking on the straw and feeling the cool liquid enter his mouth and trickle down his throat. Sam held the beaker for him throughout the process, drawing the straw away occasionally to allow Dean to pause for breath, but persistently replacing it in front of Dean's lips until he had drained the contents of the beaker. As he sucked up the last dregs he started to feel a little strange.

"Feel woozy . . ." he mumbled.

"I put something in the shake that'll help you sleep."

"Don't want to . . ."

"You need to rest, Dean."

Dean swayed. The room was going dark and blotchy. "Strong . . ." he murmured, just as Sam caught him and sat him down on the bed. He felt himself being guided down, felt his feet being guided onto the bed and his shoes pulled off, felt the softness of the pillow under his head . . . . .

He looked like a little boy when he was asleep – features softened, hair flopping over his forehead, eye-lashes fanning over his cheeks, jaw slack, lips slightly parted. He looked so vulnerable, and as Sam watched the steady rise and fall of his chest he was filled with a kind of helpless anxiety the like of which he couldn't recall having felt before, for anyone. What more could he do to protect this ill-fated ingénue?

Sam didn't believe in coincidences. He knew it wasn't happenstance that had led him to this town, to Winchester and Copes, or to Dean's home. For good or ill, the same power that sent the visions had drawn him to Dean's side, and now he felt called to help him rise from the wreckage of his blasted life. Somehow he had to prepare the hapless young man to face the threat the Demon had made against him. But what could Sam do? The confrontation with the Demon had left him with a brutal awareness of his own impotence. None of the protective charms he'd used had worked. Would the salt lines work? The holy water? The cat's eye shells? Could he count on any of the lore he'd learned, or was the Demon above it all? Still Sam surrounded them with the paraphernalia of the life he'd tried so hard to renounce, and fell back into the habits of his former training because . . . what else could he do?

While the police had questioned Dean he'd returned to the house and salvaged everything he thought they'd find necessary or helpful. In the process he'd discovered that John's "no firearms" rule hadn't extended to the basement. There he'd found a locked cache where the ex-marine had stored some useful weaponry. A visit to a hunting shop had supplied other necessary items, and while Dean slept he organized his acquisitions in the bottom of the Impala's trunk. If it pained him to have to return to the life of a hunter, dragging Dean into it was worse, but how else was Dean going to learn to defend himself?

He'd brought Dean's laptop as well. It took only a few minutes to crack his password and then Sam killed the time while Dean slept surfing for demon omens. He found nothing definitive and that aroused mixed feelings. He knew that Dean was going to want to find his father, but he also knew there was nothing they could do at this time to help the man, so the lack of demon sign was almost a relief. On the other hand, it was never reassuring when things were too quiet. Sam glanced anxiously at his sleeping companion. He itched to be on the road. He'd feel safer once they were presenting a moving target. But, if he hoped to gain Dean's trust he couldn't simply whisk him away while he slept (though, admittedly, the thought had crossed his mind). No, Dean needed to be coherent enough to make a choice.

Almost unconsciously Sam began to widen his search parameters and before long he realized he was no longer looking for demon omens, he was hunting for a case.


	11. The Never Ending Road Scene 2

When Dean woke up he wondered for a moment why he wasn't in his own room. Then he remembered. He sat up with a violent shudder. Sam paused from what he was doing - putting things away in the back-pack - and studied him.

"Do you remember where you are?" he asked.

"Yeah." Dean's head felt a little clearer now. He didn't necessarily count that as a good thing. "What time is it?"

"Just after dawn," Sam replied and when Dean frowned, a little puzzled, he added "Saturday morning." He walked over to the kitchenette and spooned coffee into a mug.

Dean raised his eyebrows. "Man! What did you put in that shake?"

"You needed the sleep." Sam returned with the coffee and handed it to Dean.

Before drinking Dean sniffed it cautiously. It smelled dicked with. "What have you put in _this_?"

A ghost of a smile touched Sam's lips. "Just whisky."

"Oh." _What the hell._ Dean swallowed a mouthful of the dark brew. He grimaced a little from the bitterness and the rasp of the alcohol, but he appreciated the warmth of the liquid as it went down.

"You should take a shower," Sam told him. "Then we'll go out and get breakfast. We need to talk."

_Oh, fuck._ That sounded ominous. Nothing good ever followed the phrase "we need to talk."

"I got you a change of clothes. I hope they're OK. I had to guess at your size."

Sam handed him a small pile of garments that were crisp with newness.

Why had he bought new clothes? Why hadn't he just – Then Dean understood, and he didn't want to think about it. "What do I owe you for these?" he asked.

"Later. Go shower."

There was no telling how long Dean might have stayed in the shower just letting the hot water run over him, but when it started to run cold it brought him back to his senses and he hastily finished washing then dried himself and dressed. Sam hadn't done a bad job of judging the sizes.

"The shirt's a bit big for you," he commented as Dean returned to the main room.

"I'll grow into it," Dean quipped half-heartedly.

The odd assortment of effects that had littered the room the previous day had disappeared. Everything was packed up. Apparently they were on the move. But where to?

Sam handed Dean another coffee and he accepted it, but with a small pause. Not that he didn't appreciate the care Sam was taking of him, but he was just starting to wonder . . . why was he? And why was Dean accepting his attentions so readily? They'd only just met and yet here they were shacked up in a motel together like they were family or something. It was weird. Yet it felt natural, as if it had always been this way.

"Dean, sit down for a moment, would you?"

_Uh-oh._ Now it was coming. What ever "it" was. Dean was afraid he wasn't going to be able to cope with "it". His legs felt wobbly as he dropped onto the bed, and Sam sat down opposite him on the adjacent bed. He sat gazing at the floor for a few moments with his elbows on his knees and his fingers interlaced. Oh, something bad was coming. Dean could feel it.

"Dean . . . what happened to your mother wasn't an accident. You know that, don't you?"

The air left Dean's lungs in a rush. Yeah, he did know that. But it still felt like a body blow to have Sam confirm it so bluntly.

"Yeah . . . right . . ." his voice came out breathily, in little more than a whisper " . . . 'cause you saw, didn't you, Sam? You saw what she . . . where she . . . you _saw_!"

Sam nodded. "Yes, Dean. I saw," Sam confirmed gently.

"Well, you've got to talk to the police, Sam," Dean was speaking a little more forcefully now, but he still hadn't fully found his voice. "You've got to tell them what you know. They think – "

"I've spoken to the police, Dean. Trust me, they can't help us. This is outside their experience."

"But Dad's in trouble, Sam, if he isn't dead already. I can feel it!"

"Yes, he is in trouble."

Again with the body blow.

"But there's nothing you can do to help him just right now and, the thing is, you're in danger, too, Dean."

"I am? But why – ?"

"Dean, you're mother's dead and your father's missing. You do the math."

_Man._ The dude wasn't pulling any punches.

"You want some more whisky with that?" Sam indicated the coffee that was listing precariously in Dean's hands. Dean nodded dumbly. Sam went to his pack and came back with a small flask that he emptied into Dean's mug.

Dean took a gulp and coughed slightly. "S – so . . . are you saying you know something about all this, Sam?"

Sam sat down and stared at the floor again then he took a breath. "I'm someone who knows something about something. Let's just say I've come across cases like this before. I've had experience investigating things the police aren't equipped to deal with. My 'skills', as you referred to them the other night, . . . that's how I got them. I was brought up that way. I've spent my life . . . well, you could call it the family business."

Dean tried to absorb what Sam was telling him, but he didn't feel like he was getting the whole picture. "So you're . . . what? . . . like a P. I.?"

Sam hesitated. "Something like that, I guess."

They were silent for a few moments and Dean took another gulp of coffee. "Sam, do you think there's a chance Dad's still alive?"

Sam paused for a moment but then nodded. "Probably . . ." he seemed to be about to add something but thought better of it.

"Well, then we have to find him, Sam!" Dean cried. "We have to – "

"We will, Dean. I promise. Trust me, I want to find him as much as you do. But right now I don't have any leads – "

Dean made to interrupt but Sam forestalled him. "I'm looking, Dean. And as soon as I have something concrete I'll tell you, but we can't go off half-cocked. We need to be ready when we act. We need to be sure we know what we're doing and right now . . . right now you just need to get out of town, Dean. We need to get you away from here and under the radar."

Dean blinked uncomprehendingly. "Get out of . . . ? Sam I can't just leave town right now. I have stuff . . . things I have to . . . Mum's – " he swallowed on the harsh reality of what he was about to say and his voice was hoarse as he continued. "I have to arrange Mum's funeral and there's other stuff – "

"That's taken care of."

". . . What?"

"Your mother's family's taking care of it. I spoke to your uncle . . . your uncle Ben? He's handling the arrangements. And Stan'll take care of the business. Everything's taken care of, Dean."

"Whoa!" This was just a little too much care and attention. Dean was starting to feel just a little single-white-femaled. "Wait a minute, Sam! Just . . . you can't just . . . Dude, you're really starting to freak me out now!"

Sam stared off to one side and nodded. "You're right, Dean," he said. Then he turned back and held Dean's gaze with a kind of anxious, puppy-dog sincerity in his expression that Dean had no answer for. "You're right to be freaked out. This is a totally fucked-up situation. But you're the De – you're the next target, Dean. You get that, do you?"

Dean stood up. He clasped his hands over his head as if he was trying to keep it on. Was any of this even _real_? "But why? Why, Sam? What is all this? Is it a serial killer? A mob thing? Why is all this _happening_?"

Sam rose to his feet as well. "Dean, I don't know. I don't have all the answers right now. I just have a lot of questions and speculation. But I can help you. Let me help you, Dean."

Dean glanced into Sam's eyes and his attention was caught by the blue hues shining in their depths. What was it about that blue light that seemed to instantly claim his loyalty and his trust?

"I know it's hard, Dean. I know we just met and we don't know each other from Adam, but I need you to trust that I know what I'm doing. I just need you to give me a chance to prove that to you."

Dean shook his head in bewilderment. "So, what do you . . . you want us to just go, just like that? Just jump in the car and drive? Now?"

Sam didn't answer with words, but his expression was clear.

"Where?" Dean asked, almost fearfully.

Sam turned toward the kitchenette. For the first time Dean noticed there was a laptop open on the table. _Hang on. His laptop!_

Sam turned the screen toward him. "I've been researching a missing persons case at Castor's Passage. A couple disappeared last week while they were driving along the Lestridge Road. The cops found the car but no bodies. They're the tenth couple to go missing in the last twenty years on that same stretch of road. I think we should look into it."

Dean stared at the screen but he didn't have the wherewithal to read the reports Sam had been surfing there. There was only one issue he could focus on at the moment. "Missing persons?" he repeated. "Are you saying you think this is related to Dad's disappearance?"

A beat, then Sam nodded slightly. "Indirectly." He continued, a little hurriedly. "At the very least I think it'll give you an idea of the kind of thing we're up against. I've taken a look at the route. We could be there in three hours. Before we go, though, I want to check we've got everything we need. I went back to the house yesterday and picked up some stuff for you. I made a list. You should take a look at it and tell me if you can think of anything I missed."

Dean had a sense that he was being railroaded, but the missing persons case was a focus. It gave him a sense of doing something constructive. But three hours away?

"I should . . . call a few people before we leave."

Sam sucked a breath through his teeth. He looked doubtful. "Ok," he said. "But keep the list as short as you can. And don't tell them exactly where you're going. Just say you're going on a road trip . . . taking some time out to deal. Then you should get rid of your old phone. It could be used to trace you. We'll get you a new one."

Dean's brain was beginning to buzz. He hoped he _was_ right putting his trust in Sam because it seemed every move he was making now was putting him more and more in the strange young man's hands.

"Sam . . . how did you get my password . . . for my laptop?" he asked.

"It didn't take long to guess. Cherry pie's your favourite, right?"

Dean blinked. "How did you know?"

"You said. At the bar."

"Uh huh." Dean nodded, a little open mouthed. "So, you were just borrowing it to research that case, right? You didn't like . . . read my emails or stuff while you were there?" Dean noted with relief that Sam actually looked a little shocked at the suggestion. To lighten the moment he added "and I don't want to find any gay porn in my search history next time I log on, either."

For a moment Sam looked a little stunned then he just rolled his eyes and walked out to the car while Dean made his calls. After the conversation/argument with Penny he decided just to text everyone else. He couldn't blame her for doubting the wisdom of what he was doing, and he couldn't logically justify the faith he was putting in Sam, so he wound up just getting belligerent and bloody minded. The call didn't end well. Throwing the cell phone into a trash can came easily after that.

"Problem?" Sam asked as Dean walked up to the Impala.

Dean indicated with a sharp jerk of his head that he didn't want to talk about it. Sam handed him a list and opened the trunk, and Dean found himself staring at the salvaged remains of his former home.

He couldn't focus on the list. It was hard enough to fix on the contents of the trunk as his vision began to blur.

"I tried to think of everything you might need," Sam said. "If there's anything else you can think of, we can make a stop before we leave. Only stuff you really need, though, Dean. And only if it was downstairs. If it was on the upper level . . ." Sam's voice trailed off and he left the thought unfinished.

Dean's finger trailed over the spine of a leather bound album that sat to one side of the trunk. "You brought photos . . ." His voice was a whisper.

Sam nodded. "Well, people always say they'd save the photo albums, don't they?" He shrugged. "I sometimes wish I'd brought a couple with . . ." He hitched in a breath. "Was there anything else?"

For long moments Dean couldn't think of anything. Anything at all. Then, as he stared at the flotsam and jetsam of his life it occurred to him there was something missing.

"My guitar," he whispered hoarsely.

"Stuff you really need, Dean."

"I need it."

Sam gazed at him for a beat then nodded. "Was it downstairs?"

Dean frowned. He couldn't remember.

"I'll look for it." Sam took the list from Dean's numb fingers and he felt the pressure of a warm hand against his back as Sam guided him to the front of the car.

Afterwards Dean could never recall them returning to the house. Perhaps Sam had parked in a different road. He vaguely remembered him returning with the guitar and placing it on the back seat. There was another brief fuel stop where Sam had tried to persuade him to eat some breakfast. He'd wound up leaving that on the back seat, too. Everything went by in a haze. In the end, Dean couldn't even remember having left town.


	12. The Never Ending Road Scene 3

_No stop signs  
>Speed limit<br>Nobody's gonna slow me down  
>Like a wheel<br>Gonna spin it  
>Nobody's gonna mess me 'round . . .<br>_

"Dean?"

_Hey Satan  
>Paid my dues . . .<em>

"Dean?"

"Hmm?"

"I was just wondering . . . do you still need that up quite so loud?"

Dean looked up from the laptop. The request was made very gently, but Sam looked tense . . . pretty much all over. After three hours of AC/DC, Metallica, Motorhead, and now AC/DC again, played pretty much full blast, Dean conceded it probably wasn't surprising. He reached forward and turned down the volume then returned to his research.

"Thanks." Sam relaxed visibly. The wonder was that he hadn't raised an objection sooner.

Somewhere between Metallica and Motorhead they'd stopped for coffee and Dean had managed some late breakfast. After that he'd started to look at the pages Sam had book-marked on his missing persons case. So far he'd found no obvious connection between the victims, other than that they were all couples of some description and they'd all been driving along the Lestridge Road at night. He couldn't claim he'd given the material his full attention, though. Often he'd read the same page, even paragraph, over and over again without taking in the sense of it, but at least the effort was keeping his mind occupied and that was the main thing.

It was late morning when they reached the outskirts of Castor's Passage. A few miles before the town they hit a road block and had to slow as they were navigated through a lane closure. Police and emergency vehicles were gathered near a sharp bend in the road and the wreck of a car was being winched out of a gully that dropped steeply to the right of it.

Some distance beyond the corner Sam parked and turned back to gaze ruminatively toward the scene they'd just witnessed. "I wanna check that out," he said. Getting out of the car he went to the trunk and took out his back pack and after a few moments of rummaging found what he was looking for and his head appeared next to the passenger door.

"You wanna come with?" he asked through the open window.

Warily, Dean got out of the car and followed Sam back to the crash site. He didn't think the authorities were likely to appreciate rubber-neckers. As they approached the corner Sam was inspecting the road and checking over the edge of the gully, then he glanced back at the wrecked car.

"Hmmph," he grunted.

"Is this it?" Dean asked quietly. "Is this the road?"

Sam nodded his confirmation.

Dean frowned and cautiously peered over the edge into the thick brush that obscured the depths of the gorge. "Pretty steep," he muttered. He looked back down the road, then at Sam. "Sharp bend, on a corner, no guard rail," he noted. "Are you sure there's a mystery here?"

"No tire marks," Sam observed. "Doesn't look like they tried to brake."

"Maybe they never saw it. All the accidents have been at night."

"Where are the bodies?"

Dean glanced back at the wreckage. The windscreen was well smashed. "Maybe they're still down there somewhere. Looks like they went through the windscreen."

"Where's the blood?"

Dean looked again at the car. That was a good question. The glass and the hood did seem remarkably clean. Movement caught his attention and he tensed as he saw a man with a badge headed their way.

"Sam, we should go back now," he murmered.

Sam shook his head. "I want to ask some questions. Just act casual. Carry on checking out the gully and leave the talking to me."

"Gentlemen, I'm going to have to ask you to move on," said the sheriff. "This is a crime scene."

Sam reached into his jacket, pulled out a wallet flipped it open and briefly showed its interior to the officer. "US Marshals, Sheriff," he announced. "Padalecki and Ackles. We're investigating the recent disappearances."

Dean stifled a gasp, shot a quick, uncomfortable grin of greeting at the officer then busied himself with checking out the gully as Sam had suggested. _Oh, yeah!_ He was checking the _hell _out of that gully.

The sheriff narrowed his eyes at Sam. "You look pretty young for a US Marshall," he observed doubtfully.

"Yes, thank you, Sheriff," Sam replied wearily. "I've been told that before." His cool, slightly condescending tone was exactly that of a fed who was tired of having his authority questioned by small town lawmen.

Dean edged awkwardly away from the conversation. He was pretty sure there was some gully over that way he hadn't checked out yet.

"Is this the case reported last week?" Sam continued. "You're just recovering the vehicle now?"

"No, this is a fresh incident. Happened just two nights ago."

"Same circumstances? Couple driving at night? No bodies found?"

"No bodies, no blood, no fingerprints, no sign of struggle," the sheriff conceded. "It's like they just vanished."

"Have you established any connection between the victims other than that they were couples?"

"None we can find. Two of the couples were college kids but before that it was a retired couple and this latest incident was a young married couple. All different backgrounds."

"All local?"

"Mostly but not all."

"So what's your theory?"

The sheriff sighed. "Serial killer? Kidnapping ring? Right now those are our best guesses but, honestly? We don't know. We've got nothing that makes sense. If you guys can turn up anything new, I'd welcome it."

"Mind if we take a look at the vehicle?"

"Sure, go ahead."

Sam nodded his thanks to the officer then headed toward the smashed car with Dean following.

"Sam, what the hell?" he hissed, but Sam appeared absorbed in his inspection. He completed a slow circuit of the vehicle, studying it carefully, then fished in his pocket and pulled out some weird piece of tech. He pointed it toward the car and it started flashing and chirruping excitedly. Dean was intrigued in spite of himself.

"What's that?" he asked.

"EMF monitor," Sam replied.

Dean was nonplussed. "EMF?" he repeated. "As in electromagnetic fields? What would be causing that?"

"Nothing natural," Sam replied grimly.

Dean found that response just the tiniest bit disturbing. "And by 'nothing natural' you mean . . . 'something man-made'? . . . Right?"

Sam took something else out of his pocket. This time Dean recognized it as a digital recorder. What was he recording? The EMF monitor?

"_Right_, Sam?"

Sam replaced both instruments in his pocket and called over to the sheriff. "Thanks, Sheriff. I think we've got everything here. We'll let you know our conclusions."

The sheriff waved acknowledgement and Sam beckoned Dean away with a sideways tilt of his head. Dean followed but inside him his anxiety was starting to curdle into the beginnings of a vague, unfocussed anger. Now that the hurricane in his head was slowly downgrading some of the detritus of the last twenty-four hours was starting to stick to the walls. As they neared the Impala he drew alongside Sam.

"Ackles and Padalecki?" he growled. "Where d'you come up with those jokers?"

"Yellow Pages."

"Sounds about right. I'm surprised you didn't go the whole nine and say we were Agents Mulder and Skully."

"Meaning?" Sam asked, casting Dean an apprehensive glance.

"Meaning you just impersonated a federal marshall!" he snapped. "Do you know how freakin' illegal that is? And what was all that crap about EMF? Just what kind of investigator do you think you are, exactly?"

Sam sucked in a deep breath. "The presence of an electro magnetic field is an indication of – "

"I know what it indicates, Sam! I know about freakin' salt and holy water, too. I read. I watch TV. What are you giving me here, Sam? You think this is a fucking ghost story?" He was starting to lose it a little and as his voice got louder Sam threw a nervous glance back toward the corner. "This isn't the fucking TV, Sam. That was a real crime scene back there, and those were real cops and that's a real fucking fake I.D. in your pocket! Are you trying to get us arrested?" Sam was making shushing motions. He put a hand on Dean's arm and tried to lead him back to the Impala but Dean shook him off. "I didn't follow you out here so you could feed me Scooby snacks. You told me this case was connected to Dad's disappearance. Are you trying to tell me now that Mom was killed by a _ghost_?"

Sam glanced back toward the corner and drew in another sharp breath. "Not a ghost, no," he said.

"What then? Ghouls? Demons? Vampires? Zombies?"

Sam turned his face back and fixed Dean's eyes with his. When he spoke his voice was low and steady. "Dean, just take a moment," he insisted. "Take a moment and think . . . and then just answer me one question . . ." He paused long enough to make sure he had Dean's full attention . . . then he dropped the nuke. "Does the way your mother died strike you as normal?"

Dean reeled for a moment then, in a flash, his anger erupted into white hot rage. Without a breath of a thought he grabbed the front of Sam's shirt and slammed him backwards into a tree. "Guh!" Sam gasped as the impact rocked his body.

"Nothing about this is _normal_!" Dean croaked. The very air seemed trapped in his chest and he had to force his voice through it. "My whole _life_ isn't normal. _You _don't strike me as normal right now!"

They were almost nose to nose, breathing the same pocket of air, and Dean was glaring right into the tall young man's eyes, but Sam didn't say or do anything. He didn't try to defend himself or push Dean away, he just stood there and stared at Dean wide eyed, breathing rapidly. With a lack of any kind of response from Sam, Dean's anger began to falter and fizzle. Nothing happened. And the longer nothing continued to happen the clearer it became to Dean that this wasn't achieving anything . . . and all this intense eye contact was just starting to get . . . weird.

As quickly as it had come, the passion that had animated him evaporated into air and he just felt helpless and lost. He felt as if the post he'd been leaning against was tilting and he was toppling right along with it. This whole situation was freakin' insane and Sam was the only one who'd seemed to have some kind of handle on it all . . . but what did that say about Sam?

Dean sat heavily on the trunk of the Impala. "What am I doing here, Sam?" he groaned. "I'm hundreds of miles from home and I don't know who the fuck you are . . . and I don't even have a cell phone any more." How readily he'd grasped at the carrot Sam had dangled: a strange case in a strange town, and a hint that it might somehow lead him to his father; but now he wondered if it had just been an excuse to run away, as if he could escape the horror and all the responsibility it had left in its wake. Almost the last thing Dad had said to him was that he had no sense of direction in his life. And Dad was right. All he ever did was attach himself to the nearest charismatic trouble maker and follow them around like an excited Yorkshire terrier. He wondered what it was he was seeking in these people that he felt he lacked in himself: a mind of his own, maybe? Sam was just Jimmy Marsters all over again . . . only Sam made Jimmy look like a basket of kittens.

Sam sat down beside him on the trunk and suddenly Dean was reminded acutely of the man's size and his strength. An uneasy frisson skittered down his back as he remembered how easily Sam had swept him to the floor the night they'd met, how he'd disabled the hustlers in moments when they'd attacked him . . . and Dean had just thrown him at a tree and lived to tell the tale. He was lucky Sam hadn't snapped every bone in his body.

"You're dangerous, Sam," he breathed. "You're gonna wind up getting us arrested or worse . . . and all this X-Files stuff . . ." Dean hesitated. Was it safe even suggesting this? "Are you . . . ? . . . There isn't any medication you're supposed to be taking, is there?"

Sam turned and stared at Dean. His eyebrows were raised but he didn't look angry. He even laughed softly, a deep rich laugh that Dean found peculiarly soothing.

"I'm not psychotic, Dean," Sam assured him. "And I'm not delusional . . . But you're right . . . I'm not a safe person to be with." The smile slipped from Sam's face and Dean instantly missed the dimples that had accompanied it. "And, honestly, I don't even know if I can protect you. I just . . ." He looked down and shook his head then for a few moments he just stared off into the distance, his brow wrinkled with thought and obvious worry, then he seemed to come to some kind of decision. Fishing in the pocket of his jeans he pulled out the car keys and reflectively tossed them in his hand a couple of times before holding them out in front of Dean.

"Dean, I swear to you my only thought in bringing you here was keeping you safe," he said. "But if you really want to drive back home I won't try to stop you. Just drop me in town first, would you? And, if you could do me one more favour before you leave, I'd really appreciate it."

Sam was doing the puppy dog eyes thing again and Dean could feel his defenses crumbling under the assault of his sincerity.

"What's that?" he croaked.

Sam drew in a deep breath. "Do you have GoldWave on your laptop?" he asked.


	13. The Never Ending Road Scene 4

The waitress put the plate down in front of Dean and gave him a beaming smile and he winked reflexively back at her. He had ordered the bacon and cheeseburger out of habit. He wasn't really hungry. Or, at least, he hadn't thought he was but as the smell of the melted cheese wafted up to him he was surprised to feel a responsive gurgle in his stomach. He gazed at the burger for a moment then took a bite. Once he tasted the bacon he discovered he really was hungry after all. Sam, it turned out, really did like salads . . . but at least he was eating a steak with it this time. All that muscle needed some protein from somewhere.

Dean continued to chew greedily as he returned his attention to the recording. As he expected, it contained the noise of the EMF monitor, birdsong and crickets . . . and his own voice saying "right, Sam?" rather testily.

"There! Did you hear that?" Sam demanded.

It was hard to hear anything above the noise of cutlery and the barista machine but Dean turned up the volume and noticed a kind of stuttering quality to the recording. He frowned. "Yeah, you're right. There's something on here, some kind of distortion."

"That's what I need you to isolate. Can you slow it down and take out the hiss?"

Dean gave Sam a withering look. "I'm majoring in sound engineering, dude," he reminded him.

After a couple of passes the sound was clearer and seeming less like random noise. When he slowed it down again it started to take on the quality of a human voice on fast forward. He glanced at Sam who was watching him expectantly. Dean started to get goose bumps. He slowed the recording down once more and played the result.

From the laptop's speaker a man's voice clearly announced: "There's only one way this can end."

Dean experienced a phenomenon he'd only ever heard about before: he felt the hairs on the back of his neck standing up. "Ok . . . that's really . . . creepy," he conceded.

Sam leaned forward. "It's called EVP: Electronic Voice Phenomenon," he explained. "The same energies that create the electromagnetic fields can affect recording equipment - audio and video."

Dean played the recording again. "There's only one way this can end," the voice insisted. Dean closed the laptop. He spent a few moments in thought, just running a thumbnail over one eyebrow. Sam was watching him with an intense and eager expression on his face.

"You've come across this before?" Dean asked him.

Sam nodded.

"Well, I haven't," Dean acknowledged, "But I've read about it." He passed a hand across his eyes. "Listen, Sam, I'm open-minded. I can believe there might be a natural phenomenon that we refer to as ghosts. Maybe there's something about extreme emotions that can be imprinted on the environment, like a photograph or a movie, and maybe sensitive people – and recording equipment – can pick it up. Maybe it's electromagnetic like you say."

Sam nodded. "But what you're describing is really just something that's known as a death echo. It's just a replay of the moment of death over and over again, usually in the place where it occurred. It's about as dangerous as a scary movie."

"And you don't think that's what this is, then?"

"No, this is an angry spirit."

"A spirit?" Dean repeated dubiously.

"A residual essence of an actual victim of violence that hasn't moved on. It's still bound to the place where it happened, becoming more confused and violent and angry until it starts taking its frustration out on the living, usually trying to recreate the original violent event in some way."

Dean shook his head. "See, this is where you lose me, Sam," he said. "'Cause I don't believe in spirits or souls, or an afterlife, or other planes or any of that dualism crap. This is it. This is all there is." He grabbed Sam's hand. "Flesh, and bone and blood."

Sam's eyes widened in shock and he hastily pulled his hand away, clearly not comfortable with the touchy-feely stuff.

"People don't go anywhere when they die, Sam," Dean continued. "They just stop, like a car stops when you kill the engine. When you're dead, you're d – " Suddenly Dean heard what he was saying . . . And the body blows kept coming. Even out of his own mouth. For a while there he'd been caught up in all this supernatural talk and he'd forgotten to remember not to think about the thing he was trying not to think about. But now the image played before his eyes once more . . . the woman on the ceiling . . . the image of his mother's death . . . his mother's _violent_ death . . . _no _. . .

. . . _No._

"So, what do you think is killing these people, then, Dean?" Sam persisted.

Dean dragged his attention, kicking and screaming, back to the conversation. "You're sure they're dead, then?" he asked.

Sam nodded. "Yeah, I'm sure."

Dean studied him. He really did sound like this stuff was all just a job to him.

"Sam, have you ever actually seen a ghost - a spirit, I mean."

"A few." . . . _So matter-of-fact_ . . .

Dean opened the laptop once more and stared at the screen. He didn't play the recording again but he could still hear the voice: _There's only one way this can end._

"Is this for real, Sam?" he asked. "Seriously? This is what you do? You're . . . a paranormal investigator or something?"

Sam sat nodding his head for a moment or two, but it didn't exactly seem like a confirmation, and when he finally spoke it was to qualify Dean's suggestion.

"I wouldn't characterize myself as an investigator exactly."

"Then what?"

Sam fixed Dean with his intense gaze. "I'm a hunter," he said. "I don't investigate paranormal phenomena, I hunt supernatural creatures . . . things that are hurting and killing people, and I put a stop to it."

"How?"

"There are methods: rituals, spells, objects and substances that ward off evil. It depends on what you're dealing with."

"You're talking about witchcraft!"

"Dean, I'm talking about an arsenal - supernatural weapons, if you like."

"Like the salt and the holy water?"

"That's right."

_Protection against monsters . . ._

"Dean, have you never experienced anything out of the ordinary yourself before now?"

"What? No."

"No odd dreams? Premonitions?"

"No."

"Objects mysteriously moving around you?"

"No."

"You've never seen anything weird, nothing that might have been a glimpse of an apparition or visitation of any kind?"

"N – " Dean hesitated. "No."

Sam frowned and gave him a searching look. "Are you _sure_?"

"Yes, I'm sure," Dean responded irritably. "Why?"

Sam's lips shrugged on his behalf. "Most people have had brushes with the supernatural, they just don't recognize it. They pass it off as imagination or try to rationalize it with some natural explanation."

A few moments passed interrupted by nothing except the clink of crockery and the sound of the cash register. Sam was still studying Dean closely.

"Nothing, Dean?" he pressed.

Dean shifted the focus and went on the offensive. "Sam, does this case actually have anything to do with Dad's disappearance?"

Sam hesitated then sat back in his seat. "No," he admitted, bluntly.

"Then what are we doing here?" Dean demanded.

"It was a case. Something real and practical I could show you. If I'd said 'supernatural' to you this morning, would you have listened?"

Dean didn't reply but gazed steadily at Sam. His lack of response was an answer in itself.

"Now you're listening."

"I've heard a voice on a recording. Maybe there's a natural explanation for it, maybe there isn't." Dean growled stubbornly. "Doesn't mean I've bought your bill of goods yet."

Sam was silent for a moment and Dean tensed. They both knew it wasn't just about the EVP, and Dean was afraid Sam was going to point that out . . . again. But he didn't say it. He just said "help me work this case then. Let me show you what I do. Give me a chance to convince you."

The waitress passed their table and refilled their coffees. Dean gave her the briefest acknowledgement and when she'd gone he leaned forward and arrested Sam with his own fixed gaze.

"Sam, look me straight in the face and tell me the truth," he demanded. "Can you help me find Dad?"

Sam's hazel-blue eyes stared back at him, unwavering. "Dean, I can't give you any cast iron promises. Like I said, I have no concrete leads at the moment. But I will help you. Yes."

Dean felt something between reassurance and frustration. In spite of Sam's promise of help, they still seemed to be standing still.

"Sam, I can't just sit here," he groaned. "I have to do _something_."

"Then do what you can do," Sam replied earnestly. "Help me solve this case. Dean, there are people dying here, and we can help. We can end it."

Dean thumbed at his eyebrow again then took a deep breath. "Ok, well, what's the next step, then?"

Sam showed obvious relief before becoming business-like. He pulled out his wallet and held out a wad of notes to Dean. "First off, you'd better get yourself a new cell-phone," he said.

Dean surveyed the cash ambivalently. Everything about Sam seemed to come with a double side of reassurance and anxiety.

"Do I even want to know where you're getting all this money all of a sudden?" he asked.

Sam hesitated then screwed up his nose and shook his head.

Dean wiped his hand round the back of his neck and sighed. "We're not in Kansas any more, are we?" he observed.

Sam laughed hollowly. "Trust me, it's no safer there."


	14. The Never Ending Road Scene 5

The guy who sold him the phone was a chatty type. He was curious why Dean was visiting the town so Dean gave him the road trip story and the guy was soon suggesting places nearby that he should visit. It seemed natural to bring up the subject of the lane closure and the "accident" as Dean referred to it, but the word elicited a snort of derision from the man.

"Not an accident?" Dean asked.

"It's always couples that have 'accidents' on that road," the man replied. "And they never find the bodies. So you tell me."

"Still, there's gotta be a rational explanation, hasn't there?" Dean suggested.

"That's what people keep saying but, if you ask me, what's irrational is to keep insisting there must be a natural explanation when it's obvious something's not right. That road's had a reputation for years."

"How so?"

The man gave Dean a hard look, like he was gauging how he was going to react. Dean tried to assume an open-minded expression . . . whatever an open-minded expression would look like. Presumably he succeeded, for the man continued.

"That road changes at night. During the day it twists and turns like any mountain pass, but at night – " He paused, and Dean thought he seemed to shudder. "It changes. It's just one long, straight road leading nowhere. How many people have to die to prove there's a "rational" explanation for it?"

It seemed to Dean there was a flaw in this little urban legend. "Well, it can't change every night, surely, or people would be disappearing all the time."

"Do you wanna be the one who's driving along there when it does change? Me, I just don't go up there at night. Not any more."

Dean caught some significance in those last words and pressed a little further. "Have you had some kind of . . . personal experience up there?" he asked.

The man gazed coolly at Dean for a few beats then nodded. "I was on that road one night when it changed. I looked ahead and it was straight as far as I could see, and it was like I could see it going on forever. And I knew, as sure as I've ever known anything, that if I went any further I'd never come back. So I just turned around, and I've never driven up there at night since."

Either the man was on the level or he was a damn good story teller. He had Dean's flesh creeping. There was one more question that had to be asked, though. "Were you with anyone at the time?"

The man hesitated and his face acquired a slightly pink hue when he replied, "Nah, I was by myself that time."

Dean suppressed a smile. _Well, you weren't with anyone you were supposed to be with, that's for sure._

As Dean left the shop he felt a little chuffed with himself. "Well, look at me _investigating,_" he muttered, with a grin, and gave a little self-congratulatory toss of the head. "How's that, _Agent Padalecki_?"

He turned his attention to his new cell-phone. His first call was to Stan. He was still clinging to the hope that Dad had called him, but he hadn't. Stan wanted to know where he was and he told him California, without being specific, and that he and Sam were fine.

"And how come you and Sam are joined at the elbow all of a sudden?" Stan wanted to know. "The way he was organizing things after the accident you'd have thought he was your brother or something. You didn't even know him before all this happened, did you?"

Dean's stomach started to churn. This was the kind of conversation he'd been hoping to avoid. He cleared his throat. "I think he's just . . you know, trying to help . ."

"Well, I could have done with his help here right now. This was supposed to be his job, after all. Oh, and the police are wondering why you two left town in such a hurry, by the way."

Dean tried to smooth out his eyebrows with his thumb and forefinger. He felt like he was making a down payment on an early stomach ulcer. "What are they saying?"

Stan grunted. "I don't know that they're _saying_ anything, exactly. They're just _wondering_. Out loud, if you know what I mean."

"Well . . . I'm just . . . taking time out to deal, Stan . . ."

Maybe the stress was starting to show in Dean's voice because Stan paused briefly. "Yeah. Ok, Dean. I get that . . ."

Dean wasn't sure he did.

"But why with Sam? What about that girlfriend of yours? Couldn't you have gone away somewhere with her?"

_Penny_. Dean felt a vague pang, a mixture of longing and guilt. "She's got exams. Listen, Stan, I've got to go," Dean was in a hurry to end this fruitless conversation. "If you do hear from Dad, could you just give him this number and get him to call me?"

"Yeah, of course, but – "

"Gotta go, Stan. Bye."

Dean stared at the useless piece of tech in his hand. He was still cut off from everything that mattered and his stomach ached with the things he wanted and couldn't have. He wished, he _so_ wished Dad would call and tell him that somehow it had all been a big mistake and everything was really fine. Mom was at home worrying about where Dean had gone, and whether he'd be home for dinner. She was baking pie –

A lump rose to Dean's throat. He shook his head and growled it back down into his gut. He should call Penny. He _should_ call Penny. She was probably out of her mind with worry. He felt guilty not calling her, and it wasn't that he didn't want to talk to her; he just didn't want to argue with her. What he really wanted was to just curl up on a bed with her somewhere and just hold her. He could really use a hug right now. And, whatever else Sam might be, Dean was pretty sure he wasn't a hugger.

When he returned to the café he was surprised – almost shocked, even - to find Sam chatting up a couple of pretty young girls. Well, what do you know? Maybe the guy had a dick after all. As he walked up Sam was fingering a pendant one of the girls was wearing.

"Actually, it means just the opposite," he was saying. "A pentagram is protection against evil, really powerful. I mean, if you believe in that kind of thing."

"Sam here was a consultant for _Unsolved Mysteries_," Dean added helpfully. "Did he mention that?"

From the glare Sam gave him it appeared he didn't appreciate Dean's help. He concluded his conversation with the young women rather abruptly and all but frog-marched Dean out of the café.

"Why the hurry?" Dean asked. "I think you were making some headway, there. So do you find this supernatural gig works with the ladies?"

"I was gathering _intel,_ Dean!"

"_Oh_. That."

"I may have found a connection between a couple of the victims."

"Is that a fact?" Dean was less enthusiastic about the news than he should have been. It was going to scoop his story.

"Apparently both the college guys were cheating on their girlfriends."

"More than one randy college kid?" Dean responded with mock surprise. "I'll alert the media."

"Infidelity is a motive for violence," Sam pointed out.

Dean shrugged a grudging acknowledgement.

"It's something to pursue, anyway. The sister of one of the latest victims lives in town. I'd like to have a word with her, see if it throws up anything."

Sam began striding purposefully up the road and Dean fell in beside him. "Actually, I picked up some intel myself in the shop." He tried to make the comment casually, and not at all like a dog that wanted to be patted for fetching a stick. Sam actually stopped walking and turned to Dean with unabashed interest, so Dean reported the gist of the conversation and waited for his biscuit.

Sam stood deep in thought, absorbing the information. "That's interesting. We should check that out. Good. Good, Dean."

The grin that rose to Dean's face faltered half way as he wondered what Sam meant when he said they should check it out.

"I want to interview the sister first, though."

_Uh-oh_. "Who are we going to pretend to be this time? The feds again?"

Sam shrugged.

_Damn._ Dean sighed. "Well, at least come up with better names than Ackles and Padalecki this time. I mean, what? Are you Polish now?"

"You think you can do better?" Sam challenged.

Dean grinned. "Damn straight!"


	15. The Never Ending Road Scene 6

"Alyson Holder?"

The young woman glanced from Sam to Dean. "Yes?" she responded guardedly.

Sam's face felt tight. His jaw muscles worked uncomfortably as if he were chewing on gristle. He cast a sideways glimpse at Dean who returned an encouraging hitch of his eyebrows.

Sam cleared his throat. "We're federal officers, ma'am. I'm Agent Medley, this is my colleague, Agent Hatfield." He winced and quickly flashed his I.D, and was aware that Dean had matched his action. Looking at Dean again, he found him beaming self-importantly and gave him a reproving glare. "We'd like to talk to you about your sister's disappearance."

The woman's face had fallen into a pained and weary expression. Sam now noticed that she looked pale and around her eyes he saw a faint red puffiness of recently shed tears. This was going to be difficult.

"Do I need to go through it all again? I've already told the police everything I know."

"We just need to check our facts, ma'am. We'll only take a little of your time."

She sighed, nodded and ushered them through the door. Sam glanced back at Dean and saw that his expression had lost all trace of humour. Clearly the situation had just become real for him. Sam had been surprised how quickly Dean had adjusted to their law-breaking activities; perhaps there was even a part of it that appealed to his rebel side. But this was different. This was merely painful and intrusive and Dean could identify only too well with the grieving woman. As she led them to her living room his eyes were cast down to the floor. He was patently miserable and uncomfortable with his part in this deception and it occurred to Sam that it had been a mistake to include Dean in this particular interview. As Sam went through the usual introductory questions he picked absently at a thread on the arm of his chair, trying to distance himself from the charade.

"And did you notice anything unusual in your sister's behaviour in the period before the accident?" Sam was asking.

She shook her head, "no, nothing." She answered like an automaton. These were the questions she'd already covered with the local police.

"How would you characterize her relationship with her husband?" Sam continued.

She hesitated. "I'm sorry . . . what do you mean?"

Sam sensed she was stalling; the question made her uncomfortable.

"Would you say they had a happy marriage?"

"Well, I . . . I would say probably . . . average . . ." Her voice and lips were trembling. _Crap_. Sam hated it when they got emotional. He was never sure how to handle it. He was ill-equipped to deal with other people's feelings at the best of times - hunters didn't have feelings - but if this woman broke down in front of Dean there was no telling what it would do to him. What had Sam been _thinking_ subjecting him to this? He glanced anxiously sideways to see if Dean had noticed her reaction. He had. His head was still angled down but he was watching her through lowered eyelids. Sam tensed. _Crap!_

"They had their problems, I guess." the woman continued. "Like most people." Her voice crackled and tears began to coarse down her face. He looked at Dean and his anxiety mounted as he saw the green orbs welling sympathetically. _Christ_ Dean was going to lose it!

As Sam tried to formulate a sentence that would get them out of the house quickly, Dean fumbled in his pocket pulled out a handkerchief and proffered it to the crying woman. She accepted it gratefully and began mopping at her eyes. As her free hand returned to her lap Dean leaned forward and reached toward it. He hesitated momentarily then took her hand in his own. Sam's eyes widened. His professional instincts were prompting him to intervene – federal officers did _not_ hold the hands of witnesses! – But he was immobilized by doubt, afraid of doing something that would make matters worse. Then, without any help from him, matters _did_ get worse. Dean's compassion had just encouraged the woman. She looked up at him, saw the empathy in his eyes and promptly broke down in a fit of sobbing. In a flash Dean was next to her on the sofa. He reached out to her and she leaned into his chest and allowed him to fold his arms around her, and Sam stared at the pair of them in helpless bewilderment as the whole situation spiraled out of his control. Then, as he'd feared, Dean started as well. Not full blown sobbing, not yet, but tears were running down his face. Sam made a forward movement meaning to extricate Dean from the situation, but something restrained him. As he watched, Dean's tears continued to flow, but his emotion wasn't escalating. He wasn't losing it. He was holding it together for the sake of the wretched woman in his arms. _He had it under control_ Sam stared at him in wonderment. After everything Dean had been through Sam had been convinced that the woman's outburst would trigger a total melt down, but he was beginning to realize that Dean had reserves of strength Sam wouldn't previously have credited him with.

Dean lifted an arm and tried to dry his face with the sleeve of his jacket. The action finally prompted a practical response from Sam and he reached in his pocket and handed Dean his own handkerchief. Dean took it, pressed it to his eyes and gave Sam the OK sign behind the woman's back. She seemed to become aware of the exchange and made an effort to pull herself together. She drew away from Dean apologized and offered him back his handkerchief but he shook his head.

"It's ok . . . Alyson, isn't it?" Dean reassured her.

She nodded. "I'm sorry," she repeated. "It's just that . . ." she gulped and blew her nose, "Michelle wasn't happy. She'd been very i_un/i_happy." She sniffed. "She and Nick had been arguing . . . he had an affair. With his _secretary_, if you please!"

Dean snorted. "Men are never very original, are they?" His comment actually raised a ghost of a smile from her.

"It must have made your sister very angry," Sam suggested.

"I suppose," Alyson agreed half heartedly.

"I'll bet!" Dean asserted. "Hell, I know if I found out my girlfriend was seeing another guy I'd want to kill the douchebag!"

_Hell's teeth!_ He was actually still doing his job!

"I think it crossed her mind," she acknowledged. Then she seemed to realize she'd been drawn into saying more than she meant to. "But wait . . . you don't think Michelle had anything to do with the accident? She _wouldn't_ . . . and it was Nick that was driving! – "

"No!" Dean assured her quickly. "No, of course not. Don't mind me. Always putting my mouth in gear before I've got my brain engaged."

She smiled at him quizzically. "You're not much how I'd imagine a federal agent," she observed.

"Yeah," he grinned and shot a quick glance at Sam. "I've been told that before." He stood up. "Well, I think we've got everything we need here, haven't we, Agent Medley?" He gave Sam a hard look; his voice said question, his eyes said statement.

"Yes," Sam agreed. "Thank you very much for giving us your time, Ms Holder. We're very sorry for your loss."

Out in the open air Dean was wiping away the residue of his emotional interlude with Sam's handkerchief. "Jesus!" he growled. "Argghhh! Rrrgghhh!" he blew his nose noisily.

Sam wanted to say something about how well he thought Dean was doing under the circumstances, but he couldn't think how to express it. '_Dean, you're not the pampered, soft-bellied college wimp I took you for,'_ didn't seem to hit the right note, somehow. Granted Dean was holding himself together with a combination of denial, belligerence and bloody-mindedness, but he was doing it. Sam was aware that sooner or later Dean would have to confront the issues he was currently avoiding, and he was dreading it – Dean was an emotional powder-keg, there was no predicting his reactions – but Sam would have to cross that bridge when he came to it. If they could just get through this case first, it would help.

Dean saw Sam watching him and totally misinterpreted his thoughts. "Stop looking at me like that," he snapped. Then he added "Remind me again why it was necessary to intrude on that woman's pain?"

Sam hesitated. "Because we're trying to save lives?" he offered.

"Oh. Right. That." Dean stared down at the sodden handkerchief. "Well, what's next, then?" he demanded. "And don't tell me you want to interview another grieving relative or, I swear to god, I will break your nose!"

"No, I was going to suggest we visit the library next."

Dean nodded approvingly. "Well, OK, then." He gestured the soggy handkerchief toward Sam.

"Do you – ?"

"No!"

"OK."

Dean pocketed the handkerchief, turned and stomped off down the road. Sam hastened to catch up and fell in beside him.


	16. The Never Ending Road Scene 7

Sam frowned as he sat at the library's IT hub staring frustrated at the computer screen. So far the search through old records and back issues of local newspapers had been unrewarding. He had trawled back as far as fifty years and found details of murders, domestics, random acts of violence, but nothing that seemed to link to the Lestridge Road. He glanced at Dean who was sitting at the next booth, just around the corner, and wondered if his new hunting partner was having any better luck than he was. Dean's face was filled with an expression of rapt concentration and Sam watched his eyelashes flutter as he surfed down the page, the jade irises scanning from left to right. _God. You could drown in those eyes._

In his mind, Sam found himself back on the Lestridge Road, pinned against a tree, his heart hammering against his rib cage as he stared directly into those iridescent orbs that were dark and glittering with anger. And once again he could feel the heat radiating from Dean's body, feel the warmth of his breath on his face. And he could have sworn, as they stood so indecently close together, he had seen Dean's expression change and soften and his eyes grow large and round as his pupils slowly dilated . . .

Sam shook his head impatiently and returned his attention to his own screen, but it wasn't long before his gaze was sliding around the corner once more to where Dean's hand was curled around the mouse. As he watched one neatly manicured finger lightly brushing around the curve of the scroll wheel Sam's throat constricted in a long, slow swallow.

Dean's hand lifted and Sam followed it to his face where it scratched distractedly at an itch on his nose then pushed a stray lock of hair business-like behind one ear. At least one of them was concentrating on the job, Sam admonished himself, and was just determining to return his attention to the matter in hand when Dean glanced sideways, caught Sam looking at him and tossed him exactly the same wink he had given the waitress in the café.

_Jerk!_ Sam thought irritably as his insides flipped like a love-sick schoolgirl's. Was Dean incapable of interacting with anyone without flirting with them? Did he even realize he was doing it? Sam's irritation turned to self-directed anger. This pre-occupation was getting out of hand, and it made absolutely – no – sense! He tried to reason with himself and fixed his gaze firmly in front of him as he began cataloging the illogic of this ridiculous infatuation:

1/ As undeniably good-looking as Dean was, he really wasn't _that_ exceptional.

_Oh, who are you trying to kid here? Of course he's fucking exceptional. Just look at him. LOOK AT HIM! _

Sam's gaze crept surreptitiously back to Dean's face. His lips were just barely parted and pursed in concentration, and Sam had an urge to reach out and touch them, discover if they were as soft and warm as they looked –

As if he'd been slapped round the head, Sam snapped his focus frontward once more.

2/ Dean had a girlfriend.

_Really? Well, I may be wrong, but I don't think he's called her since he got the new phone . . ._

3/ He was grieving. And despite his tendency to lace almost every conversation with innuendo, which Sam was pretty sure was just an ingrained habit with him, it was highly unlikely that Dean had any real interest in sex at this time . . .

_Do you suppose he'd be thinking about his dead mother while you're fucking him into the mattress?_

What the fuck? Sam straightened stiffly in his seat. He stared guiltily at Dean then glanced around the library as if someone might have heard the voice of the monster in his head.

4/ It was fucking unprofessional.

There was no room for sentiment in hunting, no place for attachment, and no excuse for allowing himself to be dominated by a downstairs-brained, testosterone fueled obsession with the guy whose safety was his responsibility. He'd already dropped the shoe once while he'd been pointlessly speculating about the exact degree of Dean's sexual orientation, and if he didn't throw an ice-bucket over it he was going to wind up getting them both killed. Christ, Dean had just lost his mother and he was holding it together yet here Sam was losing it over a pretty-face with a come-to-bed manner –

"How're you doing?"

"Guh!"

Dean looked up from his own research with raised eyebrows. "What's the matter with you, Jumpy?"

"You startled me," Sam mumbled, forcing his attention back to the computer screen.

"Well, next time I'll say something before I say something to warn you I'm going to say something."

Sam turned a weary, withering expression toward Dean _you irritating son-of-a-bitch I wanna kiss you so hard NO!_

Sam gave the keyboard a testy shove. "I got nothing," he grumbled.

Dean continued to study his own screen with a slight frown of concentration on his face. "I've maybe got something. It's a bit outside the box, but there's a murder and a disappearance, and it fits the time frame."

"Ok, not changing channels yet." Sam trundled his chair round to Dean's side of the desk and took a look at his screen. It showed a news item with a photograph of a young couple.

"January '78 Daniel Whitman is arrested for murdering his brother's fiancé, Carmine Hobbes." Dean began to summarize. "His brother, Saul Whitman, posts bail and then the pair of them skip town and are never seen again."

The skin tightened over Sam's forehead. "Wait a minute. The brother whose fiancé was killed posted bail?"

"Freaky enough for you?" Dean asked.

The skin on Sam's forehead settled into thoughtful grooves. "Not seeing the infidelity here."

Dean shrugged. "I figured maybe Carmine was doing the double-mint dance with both brothers."

Sam responded to Dean's expression with a grimace of disgust before posing another question: "But if it's the two brothers who disappeared, why is the spirit targeting couples?"

"Who am I? John Edward?" Dean responded, a little defensively. "I'm just reporting the facts here."

Sam shook his head. "I dunno. It's something, but it's not a perfect match. Maybe the brothers just high-tailed it to Mexico."

"And maybe they're still at the bottom of that gully," Dean growled, stubbornly clinging to his find.

Sam sat back in his chair and gazed out of the library windows. The winter evenings were drawing in now and the darkness was gathering outside.

"I think we're going to have to go up there," he said.

Dean followed Sam's gaze and glanced back through the darkened glass, then returned his attention to Sam's face.

"What, now, you mean? You want to take a drive up the road that changes _at night_?"

"It would be helpful if we could witness the phenomenon first hand."

"You want to drive up the road where the couples have been disappearing _at night_," Dean reiterated.

"I've got protection," Sam assured him.

Dean's eyebrows shot into his hairline then he started laughing.

_Oh, for fuck's sake!_

"Well, it's good to know you practice safe hunting, Sam." Dean continued to chuckle. "But, just so the ghost doesn't get confused, I want to make it clear that this is not a date. We're just going as friends, right?"

Sam's lips pruned with irritation. "That isn't funny, Dean."

Dean grinned irrepressibly. "It's a little bit funny."

And Dean was still chuckling as they made for the exit. "You've got protection," he repeated. "Ah, Sammy, you're a gift from God, you really are!"

Sam resisted the urge to slap him upside the head.


	17. The Never Ending Road Scene 8

Dean's eyes widened as Sam opened the trunk of the Impala, removed their bags etc. and lifted the bottom to reveal the weapons cache methodically arranged beneath.

"What have you done to her?" he gasped. "You've turned her into some kind of mobile gun runner!" His gaze ran over the assortment of guns, blades, stakes and other monster-specific equipment gathering bewilderment as it went.

Sam shot him a worried glance. He could appreciate this collection would be disturbing to a civilian seeing it for the first time. "We need this stuff, Dean," he said quietly.

Dean reached into the trunk, picked up the Colt 1911 semi and held it in both hands. That had come from John's store. It would be familiar to him, perhaps.

As Sam picked out the Taurus and slipped it into the back of his jeans Dean was still gazing at the Colt.

"Do you know how to use it?" Sam asked.

Dean nodded. "Can't claim to have had a lot of practice," he acknowledged in a low, gravelly voice "but, yeah, I know how it works."

"Well, quick refresher . . ." Sam lifted the gun from Dean's hands, took out some ammunition and loaded the magazine then he checked the safety before handing it back to Dean. "Let me see you do it," he said.

Dean unloaded and reloaded the magazine and repeated Sam's checks. He wasn't as smooth as Sam but he knew what he was doing. Sam nodded and returned to sorting through the stash. Dean glanced at the Taurus wedged under Sam's belt, checked the safety on the Colt again and lifted up his jacket. He checked the safety one more time before hesitantly slipping the weapon down the back of his own jeans.

"Are you planning to shoot the ghost?" he asked.

Sam pulled out two short iron spokes and handed one to Dean. "No, this is the weapon of choice for spirits: iron. It disrupts the electromagnetic field."

"And that kills the spirit . . . or . . . whatever?"

"No. It just buys time while the spirit gathers its energies. There are more permanent ways of getting rid of an angry spirit. The simplest and most effective is to salt and burn the bones . . . assuming you can find them, of course."

Dean's expression was incredulous but Sam persisted anyway. "That's for short range," he said, indicating the spoke in Dean's hand. "If we _should_ get attacked by an apparition tonight, you just thrust that straight into the middle of it."

Dean stared dubiously at the spoke. "Seriously? You _stab_ a ghost?" He mimed stabbing an invisible apparition.

"Spirit, Dean," Sam corrected. "And, yes. Of course, you hope it doesn't get that close," he added, drawing out a yard long fire iron and holding it up.

Dean glanced from his own spoke to Sam's fire iron and he assumed a mortified expression. "I feel so inadequate," he complained.

Sam rolled his eyes and handed Dean the car keys. "You drive, I'll keep watch," he said as he repacked the trunk. They moved round to the front of the Impala and Sam deposited the fire iron on top of the dash keeping the shorter spoke in his hand. As Dean dropped into the driver's seat he was humming something that Sam felt he should have recognized.

"Baa-da baa-da baa-da ba-da-da. Baa-da baa-da ba-daaaaa . . ." he sang as he dropped the spoke Sam had given him into his lap and slid the keys into the ignition. He turned a grin toward Sam and tossed him a quick hitch of the eyebrows. "I ain't afraid of no ghost!" he announced and gunned the engine. Then, as he took off up the road, he 'choof-chooffed' the rhythm and jigged along to it in his seat as he drove.

. . . . .

As aggravating as Dean's not entirely tuneful singing was, Sam was sorry when it eventually faltered and faded into silence. As they headed out of town and up the mountain pass, it struck him that Dean was gripping the wheel a little too tightly.

He wasn't sure exactly how long they'd been driving but he thought they must be approaching the outer limits of Castor's Passage and it began to disturb him that they couldn't see the bend in the road yet. He thought they must be getting close to it but the road ahead was straight as far as he could see . . . in fact it seemed to go on _fuck_ . . .

"Dean, I think you should slow d – " Sam felt the sudden drop in temperature and saw the icy fog of his breath and gripped the iron in his hand, ready for action. "Dean, stop, pull over!" he warned.

But Dean wasn't stopping. He wasn't slowing down. In fact the car seemed to be picking up speed.

"We've been on this road forever, and it was always leading us here," he said. "Whatever we did, whatever we tried to do, it was always going to come to this. This thing between us, these feelings . . . they're cursed, damned. They've made monsters of us both. There's only one way this can end."

Sam felt the chill of shock and horror gripping his limbs. It was in Dean! _Christ! It was inside Dean!_

He tried to grab the wheel and steer them off the road but Dean's arms were locked in position with preternatural strength and the wheel wouldn't budge. Sam didn't know how close they were to the corner, but he knew there was no time to be squeamish. He grabbed the iron spike and stabbed it into Dean's leg.

At the moment Dean yelled in pain the corner came into view dead ahead of them and Sam spun the wheel as fast as he could. The tyres screeched on the asphalt with the agonized squeal of a stuck pig and Sam felt the back of the car sliding to the left, then it tipped off the level with a jolt as one wheel left the road. Jumping over to the driver's side Sam practically sat on Dean's lap and floored the gas pedal, sending the car careening over the road and into the woods on the far side. Then he was driving to avoid trees, narrowly missing one then another before hitting a bank of bushes. Twigs, leaves and branches slapped noisily across the windscreen and hood as the car juddered its way through the foliage before Sam managed to hit the brakes and kill the engine and, bracing himself against the steering wheel, he threw back his arm and held Dean against the back of the seat to stop them both from hitting the windscreen as the car finally jerked to a halt.

In the aftermath Sam hauled himself off Dean and back onto his own side and sat panting for breath for a moment before he turned and looked at Dean. "Are you all right?" he gasped.

It was dark in the woods but Sam could still see the glitter of Dean's wildly staring eyes. Aside of the combined panting there was no immediate response, but then Dean opened the door of the Impala and practically fell out of the car. For a moment Sam leaned forward and cradled his head in his arms. "_Fuck!_" he gasped before opening his own door and dashing round to Dean's side of the car. He found Dean leaning over the hood.

"Dean, are you ok?"

"_No, I am not ok_! You just freakin' stabbed me!" Dean shouted. "You stabbed me in the leg with a freakin' metal spike!"

Sam was a little wrong-footed. Dean had just been possessed by an angry spirit and they'd narrowly avoided winding up in the bottom of a ravine. The leg injury seemed to him a minor issue. "It was an iron spike," he pointed out.

"What freakin' difference does it make what it was freakin' made of?" Dean yelled.

"Well . . . because of the electromagnetic field," Sam reminded him. "The iron grounds the charge and disperses the EMF."

Dean stared at Sam for a moment then braced himself against the hood, shifted his weight onto his injured leg for a moment and used his good one to stamp down on Sam's foot.

"Right, well, fucking ground that!" he snarled.

"JEEEEESUSSS!" Sam yelped as the pain ballooned in his toes and popped behind his eyes in a shower of little white dots. It took every ounce of his restraint to prevent himself from acting on his basic urge to punch Dean's lights out. Sam twisted around until he, too, was leaning on the hood of the Impala and he pawed the air with his foot like an injured horse.

Dean pushed himself upright and limped round to the front of the car. "I'll  
>tell you another thing, if you screwed up my car, I'll kill you!"<p>

Sam turned his head to stare at Dean while he continued to gasp and wince. He couldn't believe the guy. He'd just experienced the most brutal of confrontations with the supernatural and he was worried about _his car_? Shaking his head, Sam supported himself against the car as he hopped to the trunk and fetched a towel from his back-pack.

"We need to get out of here," he told Dean as he handed him the towel. "Get in the car and press this against your leg. I'll drive."

Sam hopped to the front while Dean limped round to the passenger's side. The spike that had been resting on Dean's lap had fallen onto the grass when he'd left the car and as Sam slid behind the wheel he picked it up and handed it to Dean. "If anything weird happens to me on the way back and you have to use it, don't hesitate, just stab me with it," Sam told him.

Dean twisted the spoke in his hand and tightened his grip around it, holding it ready in the stabbing position. "Right. No problem," he growled.

Dean's readiness made Sam a little uneasy. "_Only_ if you have to," he clarified.

"Gotcha," Dean growled again, but his arm didn't relax.

Sam flexed his throbbing foot and rested it against the pedal. He glanced at Dean and his leg gave a nervous twitch before he started the car and reversed it out of the bushes. They'd put some distance behind them and the lights of the town were in view again before either of them began to relax.

Dean lifted the towel off his leg and brandished it at Sam. "Look at that!" he complained. "I'm bleeding to death!"

One look at the stain was enough to assure Sam he was doing no such thing, but it had occurred to him now that maybe Dean preferred to focus on the physical injury rather than deal with the mental violation. After a few more minutes of silence, however, Dean spoke again.

"Did you_ know_ that was going to happen?" he asked in a low, quiet voice that Sam didn't mistake for calmness.

"Of course not," Sam assured him. "I was ready for the possibility of an apparition but not spirit possession. It's very rare."

"If it's so fucking rare, then why did it happen to me?" Dean snarled. "Why am I the monster magnet all of a sudden? I'm starting to feel picked on here!" There was an edge in Dean's voice that worried Sam. Was it a trace of hysteria?

"It must have identified with you for some reason . . . Can you remember what you were – what it was feeling?"

Dean didn't answer straight away. After a few moments he replied in a gravelly voice "Grief, hurt, guilt, pain, anger, despair . . . a whole shit-load of nasty crap."

Sam said nothing. He didn't feel it was necessary to labour the parallels. He shifted his foot on the gas pedal trying to find a more comfortable position. His toes were still throbbing painfully.

After a few moments Dean cleared his throat. "I'm sorry about the foot thing," he said.

Sam glanced at him with some measure of relief. He didn't care about the apology except for the fact that it indicated Dean was regaining some composure. "It's ok," he assured him.

"No, it was out of order," Dean insisted. "I do appreciate that you did what you had to back there to save our lives."

Sam shrugged.

There was another spell of silence then Dean asked. "So is this it? Is this a normal day at the office for you?"

"Not one of my best days but, yeah, I guess so."

Dean nodded mechanically as if he was absorbing that, then he said "You do realize what you do is freakin' insane, don't you?"

Sam laughed hollowly. "I'm aware."

"Ok, so long as you know." A beat, and then Dean continued. "Well, there's one good thing that's come out of this, anyway."

"What's that?"

"You owe me pie."

Sam frowned. "I do? How come?"

"I was right about the brothers."

Sam glanced at Dean, eyebrows raised. "You're sure?"

"Oh, yeah, I'm sure."

"Which one?"

"Couldn't tell . . . I seemed to know what both of them were . . ." Dean hesitated then cleared his throat. "And I know why they're attacking couples, too."

"Really?"

"Yeah." Dean cleared his throat again. "The two of them: they were a thing."

Sam frowned. "Wh . . . ?"

"They _loved_ each other."

"Oh." Sam allowed that information to settle in his mind for a few moments. "Oh."

"And that also explains the infidelity thing," Dean continued. "'Cause Daniel wasn't too happy when the love of his life tried to go legit and get himself a fiancé. Cue bloody climax and Thelma and Louise finale."

Sam still couldn't quite wrap his head around this turn of events. "But they were _brothers_!_" _he reiterated.

Dean shrugged. "What can I say, Sammy? The heart wants what the heart wants."

Sam stared at him. He couldn't tell whether Dean was being serious or if he was trying to be provocative.

"Anyway, you owe me pie," he repeated.

Sam frowned. "I don't recall us making a bet – "

"I've just been possessed by a FRICKIN' angry spirit and I WANT PIE!" Dean insisted.

Sam considered for a moment then shrugged his lips in acknowledgement. That was fair.

"Ok."

"OK!"


	18. The Never Ending Road Scene 9

So it was that Dean ended the day sitting on a motel bed with his pants off, holding a pie box in one hand and a beer in the other, and with Sam kneeling between his thighs. He reflected that it was a measure of the strange turn of events in his life that this wasn't even the weirdest thing that had happened to him that day. Discovering how Sam was funding their little hunting trip was, he was beginning to appreciate, the least of his worries. He'd barely blinked when Sam had signed the register then produced a credit card with the same false name. He supposed he would have to accept that hunting wasn't exactly a pro-ball career. Still, he had to wonder where Sam kept coming up with these freaky names. Seriously, who in the world was called _Misha_?

"OW!" he hissed.

"Hold still."

"Ow! That stings! Ow! Ow! Ow! OW!"

Sam clamped his great mitt around Dean's thigh and held it down while he continued to smear one of his evil smelling ointments onto the wound.

"Don't be such a baby. It isn't that bad," Sam assured him as he placed a dressing over it and secured it with Band-aids.

"That's easy for you to say," Dean grumbled, "You're not the one with a frickin' great hole in your leg."

Sam cast his hazel eyes upwards and he surveyed Dean through the fringe of his eye-lashes. "I've had worse," he said, and to make his point he pulled the collar of his shirt aside to reveal a long, pale caterpillar crawling across his shoulder blade. Dean reckoned there must have been about 15 stitches. "Rougaru outside Santa Fe," he explained. Then he stood up and pulled the shirt out of his jeans to reveal a reddish ridge of flesh just above his hip bone. "Shape-shifter in Cleveland," he added. For some reason, Dean felt vaguely saddened to see these wounds desecrating the magnificent body. Still, he couldn't resist puncturing Sam's little macho display.

"I got that beat," he said. Undoing a couple of buttons he exposed and pointed to his left breast.

Sam squinted at it. "I can't see anything," he replied, puzzled.

"Mary Ellen Moffat," Dean explained. "She broke my heart."

Sam stared at him blankly. "Jaws?" he elaborated. "Robert Shaw and Richard Dreyfuss comparing their scars . . . very famous . . . Seriously? You've never seen Jaws?"

Sam shook his head, unimpressed.

"How about Lethal Weapon 3 – no, on second thoughts, let's not go there."

All this was clearly going right over Sam's head so Dean returned to the more serious issue. "Did you say shape-shifter?"

Sam cracked his own beer and took a long swallow. "Yup," he confirmed.

"There are really such things as shape-shifters?" Dean wondered why he was still bothering to even go through the motions of doubting the things Sam told him but, _really_, _shape-shifters_? Sam proceeded to describe the creature, its nature, origins and feeding habits in more detail than Dean could have wished for, but somehow he couldn't stop asking questions.

"And what was the other thing? A ruby . . ."

"Rougaru. It's a kind of cannibal. Human until it gets its first taste of human flesh then it turns into a monster."

"You're making this up," Dean scoffed, unwisely.

Sam went to his back-pack and pulled out a thick loose-leaf binder. He flicked through the pages then handed it to Dean, open at a page headed "Rougaru". The page contained copious notes on the creature, and on the facing page there was an equally detailed illustration of same.

"Eeeeesh!" Dean exclaimed, drawing his head back rather quickly from the gruesome pictorial. Then he started leafing through the other pages._ Well, this isn't creepy at all_, he thought. It read like the Monster Book of Monsters. He half expected it to leap up and make a grab for his jugular at any moment. "What is this?" he asked, uneasily.

"It's my journal," Sam replied.

Dean felt a chill wash over him.

"It's a record of everything I've hunted," Sam continued. "Every hunter has one, or something like it."

Dean passed a hand round the back of his neck and found the sweat that had gathered there was, indeed, cold. "Seriously? You've personally hunted all these things?"

Sam shook his head. "Just the front section. Behind that is a summary of all the lore passed down through the family."

"So . . . it's like your Book of Shadows?"

"I'm not a witch, Dean."

"Pity. Witches are hot."

Sam stared at him aghast. "No, they're _not_!"

"Well, Shannon Doherty was."

Another blank stare from Sam.

"You never saw Charmed, either, did you?"

Sam slowly shook his head again.

"So you don't watch movies or TV . . ." Dean gazed at him with mock puzzlement. "What do you do with your time?"

Sam took a moment to absorb Dean's irony, but then he allowed himself a tiny smile, and Dean felt oddly comforted to see the traces of his dimples creasing his cheeks. "I read a lot," he responded.

Dean grinned, but then returned his attention to the disturbing journal. Apparently Sam wrote a lot as well. He turned a page and was confronted with another of Sam's horribly graphic illustrations. _Oh, surely not! _"I don't believe this, Sam! You really are giving me demons, ghouls and vampires!"

Sam took a swallow of beer, gulped rather quickly and almost choked on it. "What?" he demanded, pulling the book out of Dean's hand to check what he was reading.

"You're seriously telling me that _vampires_ exist?"

Sam closed the book and returned it to his backpack. "They do. But they don't glitter, and they don't date cheerleaders."

"And they have more teeth, apparently," Dean added, recalling the gruesome visual.

"Yep. They're fast, and they're strong. They usually sleep during the day, but they're not destroyed by sunlight, and you can't hold them back with a crucifix or gank them with a stake; you have to decapitate them."

Dean stared at Sam. That was it. He'd reached his level on crazy and now his silly meter had kicked in.

"Gank? Is that a technical term?" he asked, innocently.

"It means kill," Sam replied, in all seriousness. "It's an expression we use – "

Dean was laughing.

"You think this stuff's funny?" Sam asked, incredulously.

Dean was actually wiping tears from his eyes. "You can't see the funny side?"

"No. Really can't."

"Seriously? You're going to stand there and tell me you gank rougarus with a straight face?"

Sam glared at Dean, his lips pruning with disapproval, while Dean smirked back at him unabashed. The battle of wills persisted for several moments but then Dean saw the corners of Sam's lips twitching and he knew he had him beat. A moment later the twitch had turned into a full on grin and Sam was shaking his head, very nearly laughing, and the dimples were lighting up his whole face.

"Well, what do you know?" Dean grinned, too. "The bitch cracks a smile at last!"

He held his bottle toward Sam. Sam hesitated for only half a beat then gave in and chinked his own bottle against it.

"So, Sam . . ." Dean was a little reluctant to move on from the happy moment, but he realized they had unfinished business to attend to. "How do we gank these brothers?"

Sam's beer paused on its way to his mouth, then dropped to his side with an apparently casual gesture. "Basic salt and burn," he replied. "I figure they have to be down the bottom of that gully somewhere, just hidden where nobody's found them. I'll go down there with the EMF metre at first light, find them and torch them."

Dean felt like he'd been slapped round the face with a wet towel. Sam had been dragging him round on this case all day, was he going to leave him out of the final reel?

"You're an 'I', all of a sudden? I thought we were a team?"

Sam frowned with that little pointy up eyebrow thingy that he did.

"I just thought, after what just happened, you might want to sit this one out," he suggested.

"Hell, no!" Dean cried. What? Did Sam think he was a coward? "After what those sons-of-bitches did to me? I wanna gank their asses!"

Sam stared at the floor. His jaw tightened and he jerked his head stiffly to one side. "Dean . . ." he began in a low voice, "I almost got you killed back there."

_Wow._ It began to dawn on Dean that Sam had serious responsibility issues. "_We_ almost got killed back there. And those creeps used me to do it. Come, on Sam. You know you can't go down there on your own. _You _could get possessed, or attacked at least. Somebody's gotta have your back! You know I'm right. I'm right, aren't I?"

Sam was shaking his head but Dean had a feeling that meant yes. "Come on, Sam," he persisted. "You and me. Let's go kick Casper squared into the light."

Sam was giving Dean a very odd look. Eventually he stood up and dropped his empty beer bottle into a waste bin. He took Dean's bottle out of his hand.

"Hey!" Dean protested.

"If we're going to do this, we're both going to need to get some rest before dawn," he said. "Do you want a hot drink to help you sleep?"

"What are you gonna put in it this time?" Dean asked suspiciously. "Are you gonna drug me again?"

"It wasn't a drug, it was a herbal sleep remedy. Five parts valerian."

"Really?" Dean gazed up at Sam through arched eyebrows. "And the other five parts?"

"More exotic ingredients," Sam acknowledged.

"Whatever it was, it was damned powerful. I'll pass."

Sam hesitated. "Are you sure, Dean? It'd help make sure you're sleep's . . . restful."

By which Dean guessed Sam meant nightmare free. And just that thought was enough to bring the nightmare back to the front of Dean's mind and before his eyes again. He shook his head, trying to banish it to back to the cell he'd reserved for it all day.

"I'm fine, Sam. Thanks all the same."

Sam looked doubtful but he didn't argue. Presently he sat down on his own bed and kicked off his shoes. It struck Dean that he was looking tired himself. Exhausted, even. Dean wondered when Sam had last slept.

"Sam . . ."

"Hmm?"

Dean was afraid to ask the question he'd been avoiding/worrying about ever since the café, but he had to know the answer. "Angry spirits are caused by violence, right?"

"Right." Sam was rubbing his eyes.

Dean made several attempts to make his lips form the question and Sam seemed to pick up on his difficulties because he stopped rubbing his eyes and frowned questioningly at Dean.

"M . . Mom died violently, Sam," Dean said finally. "Will she – ?"

"Your mother's at rest, Dean," Sam insisted bluntly.

"How do you – ?

"Because I made sure, Dean." Sam fixed him with an earnest stare. "I saw to it." He nodded firmly for extra emphasis. "She's at peace."

Dean's focus drifted away from Sam and settled somewhere vaguely in front of him. Did he want to know what measures Sam had taken . . . no. No, he didn't. He lifted his head back abruptly, drew in a deep breath and sniffed sharply. He wiped his hand over his mouth before turning back to speak.

"Thanks, Sam – " Sam was on his back on the bed, already asleep. Dean smiled and shook his head slightly. Standing up he retrieved his beer from the sink area where Sam had left it. After draining its contents he dropped the bottle in the waste bin then opened the refrigerator and took out another. As he cracked it open, as quietly as he could, his eyes fell on Sam's back-pack. He glanced at Sam. Dean spent less time debating the ethics with himself than he did wondering if he could get away with it, but Sam seemed to be out like a light so he gingerly bent over and started easing the bag open. Once he'd managed to get the journal out without waking Sam he retired to the other side of the room with it.

To say it was absorbing reading would hardly be accurate – more like morbidly fascinating – but, either way, once Dean started he couldn't stop. He kept turning the leaves even though he could feel himself becoming more chilled with each fresh page, and his mouth was twisting into a more and more pronounced and fixed grimace.

He didn't know what disturbed him more, the seemingly endless catalog of horrors or the cool and meticulous manner in which their descriptions, histories, habitats and disgusting feeding habits, and the bizarre methods used to kill the creatures, were all methodically listed and codified in Sam's small, neat and elegant print. The illustrations were something else again. They were raw, dynamic and dark, and every line seemed to radiate anger and pain. It was as if Sam was two different people: a suffering soul trapped in a mind of steel.

It vaguely occurred to Dean that he should write that down. It was a good line.

Sam stirred in his sleep and Dean started and shivered. As he watched him, Sam turned onto his side and curled into a fetal ball. He lay with his head cradled in one arm and his other hand lay curled close to his mouth and it looked for all the world like he was about to suck his thumb. Slowly and oh-so-quietly Dean stood up and tiptoed toward the bed to look at the sleeping form.

Dean hadn't appreciated how much strain and tension Sam carried in his face until he saw him now with his muscles relaxed in sleep, and it was brought back home to him how young Sam was – not much more than a kid. It was easy to forget that. Dean's head tipped to one side as his gazed at the boy's face with its fine, delicate features. There was something profoundly gentle and fragile and pure there, and it struck Dean that he was looking at true beauty. He cast a troubled glance back at the journal and thought about the two Sam's that had seemed to be battling it out between its pages, and he wondered what either of them had to do with the sleeping angel in front of him.

Reaching over to his own bed, Dean carefully pulled the cover from it and very gently laid it over Sam as he slept. He found himself having to resist an urge to bend over and lay a kiss on the boy's forehead. He settled for tucking the cover around him before he stepped back. "Goodnight, Sammy," he whispered.

Drifting over to the window he gazed out into a darkness now full of all the monsters he'd been told didn't exist. Almost unconsciously he started humming Metallica. He glanced over at the kitchenette then back out of the window, then he frowned and shook his head. If Sam hadn't thought it was necessary, then it wasn't necessary, and he'd just be making himself look . . .

He glanced back at the bed. Hell, with it. Dean walked over to the kitchenette, fetched the salt and started laying a line along the window. It wasn't fear, it was precaution.

Once he'd satisfied himself that all the entry points were covered he returned to the journal and settled down with his beer. It took him most of the rest of the night just to cover all the monsters Sam had personally hunted. Dean could hardly fathom how he'd had time to kill so many. As he started on the second section of the journal he looked out of the window and saw that the darkness was starting to give way to the grey that comes just before the first light dawns.

He glanced over at Sam and realized, regretfully, that he should probably rouse him. Pausing from his reading he got up and made them each a coffee, setting Sam's down beside his bed and giving him a light shake. "Up and at 'em, Tiger," he said. "Rise and Shine." As Sam grunted and started returning to the waking world Dean returned the journal to Sam's back-pack, but before he closed the book he turned down a corner to mark the point he'd reached, the first page of a section headed "Demons".


	19. The Never Ending Road Scene 10

Sam still felt heavy with sleep as he sat up. He had only intended to nap but he could tell he'd been out solidly for several hours. Thinking about it, he realized he'd been awake continuously for something like seventy hours, and hadn't slept much either of the two nights prior to that. It wasn't surprising that it had caught up with him, but he wished he'd made sure Dean was asleep before he'd passed out. The evidence around the room – Dean's bed undisturbed apart from the cover that had been taken off and thrown over Sam, two empty beer bottles on the table – indicated Dean had been awake all night. Sam grimly noted the salt lines around the door and the windows. He also noticed that Dean was humming tunelessly. Sam was getting to know his tells. Dean was afraid.

Sam worked his feet into his boots as he sipped at his coffee. After going to the bathroom and splashing his face he started preparing for the hunt. This time he planned to take every possible precaution. Taking a small flannel bag from his supplies pouch he added angelica root and a couple of cat's eye shells then he pulled out his pocket knife and a small square of muslin. Dean was leaning against the room divider still nursing his coffee and humming. He was wearing his old jeans again now since the ones Sam had bought him were now lying torn and bloody over a chair.

"Are you still sure you want to do this?" Sam asked him.

"We already had this conversation," Dean growled.

Sam nodded. He was beginning to understand that Dean needed this. He needed a victory against this strange, new supernatural world so he wouldn't feel helpless against it.

"Ok, well, give me your hand."

Dean arched an eyebrow but proffered his hand as Sam reached out for it, then hurriedly snatched it back again as Sam extended his pocket knife.

"Whoa! Hey! What?" Dean objected.

"I just need a little blood for a protective charm," Sam explained.

"Use your own!" Dean exclaimed.

"I will. This is for both of us."

Dean glowered but reluctantly extended his hand once more. "I was bleeding last night," he grumbled. "You couldn't have taken some then? Yow! Jeesh! _Son-of-a-bitch!_"

Sam dabbed the blood off Dean's finger with the muslin and as he let go Dean stuck his finger in his mouth and sucked exaggeratedly. It still baffled Sam a little how, on the one hand, Dean would insist on participating in a dangerous ghost hunt and, on the other, be so precious about a little nick on the finger. He drew and added his own blood to the muslin square then dropped it in the flannel bag with the other items.

As for Dean himself, Sam was taking no chances. Taking the amulet from around his own neck he held the strange object in his hand for a few moments and gazed at it. He'd worn it for eighteen years and never thought to part with it yet, for some reason, he had no misgivings whatsoever about giving it to Dean. He held it out to its new owner.

"I want you to have this," he said.

"What is it?" Dean asked as he took it from Sam's hand, holding it up and studying the carved head with curiosity.

Sam hesitated. He didn't actually know. He'd been only four years old when Mr. Singer had given it to him, and all the old hunter had told him was that it was "very special" and it would keep him safe, and Sam had always believed it. "It'll protect you," Sam said vaguely, "Against angry spirits, possession, rougarus, shape-shifters and monsters various."

Dean didn't appear to be listening. He was still studying the carving. "I think I've seen something like it before," he said.

Sam shrugged. "I doubt it. I think it's a unique piece."

"Really? Well . . . thanks. I'll take good care of it," Dean assured him.

Sam watched as Dean lifted the cord and slipped it over his own head, and as the amulet dropped against his chest Sam felt a strange but very real and palpable glow of heat wash over his body. He was filled with a sudden conviction that the amulet was where it was meant to be. The sense of rightness he felt as it rested against Dean's chest made him feel, retrospectively, that there had been something missing there before. Dean himself didn't act as if he'd noticed anything strange or mystical. Had it just been a flight of fancy on Sam's part?

"What about you?" Dean asked.

"What? Oh, I'm covered," Sam assured him, holding up his wrist and indicating the circlet tied around it. Oddly, though, Sam felt no less protected by the amulet now that it was around Dean's neck than he had when he'd worn it himself.

Dean squinted at the braid round Sam's wrist. "Oh, yeah. I had one of those once, too. I gave it to Myra Bradley in 7th Grade. It didn't stop her getting possessive and angry."

Sam rolled his eyes. He was coming to the conclusion that some such gesture was as much acknowledgement as Dean's smart-ass comments required or as Dean expected. He picked up the salt from the kitchenette and headed out to the car to gather the rest of the equipment. Once he'd emptied the trunk and propped open the bottom with a shotgun he pulled out a duffel bag and packed the salt into it along with accelerant, a cigarette lighter, a small fire extinguisher and a torch. He added the EMF monitor and, for good measure, the infra-red thermo-scanner. With the addition of some more iron spikes and a couple of fire irons they were almost good to go. Sam handed the duffel bag to Dean and opened a box that contained comms equipment and other small items. He pulled out an earpiece for his cell-phone and a spare headset for Dean, who was poking about in the duffel bag and examining the scanner with curiosity.

"Measures cold and hot spots," Sam explained.

Dean mouthed an "oh," and nodded, returning the scanner to the bag as Sam passed him the headset.

"See if that fits your cell," Sam said, taking out his own cell and sliding his earpiece into place, then he called Dean's cell. Catching on, Dean stuck the earphones in and answered Sam's call.

"Mary had a little lamb," Sam said.

"She also had a bear," Dean responded.

Sam gave a nod of confirmation and was about to end the call when Dean added:

"I've often seen her little lamb, but never seen her bear."

Sam closed his eyes and sighed. "Seriously, Dean?"

Dean just gave an indifferent shrug, but they'd established the comms equipment was working.

"I'll drive," Sam said as he headed to the front of the car. "Get a spike out, just in case."

The last thing Sam did was to drop the mojo bag in the glove compartment just as Dean slipped into the passenger seat clutching the duffel bag as if it were a security blanket and holding a spike at the ready though, Sam noted with relief, not as aggressively as the previous evening.

"Are you ready?" he asked.

Dean nodded determinedly. "Bring it on, baby!"

Sam swung his cell round in a slow 360 degree arc, studying the camera image as he turned. "It all seems quiet," he commented.

"That's reassuring," said Dean.

"Not really," Sam replied.

Dean gave him a look. "You don't have a gismo in your bag of tricks that picks up irony, then?" he remarked.

"Pass the salt," Sam said, shooting him a warning glare to forestall any more smart comments. He put down a line around the Impala and another circle near the edge of the gully closest to where the EMF meter had shown the strongest readings then he took out a length of rope from the trunk and secured one end of it to the back of the car. As he carried the coil over to the other circle and handed it to Dean he took care not to allow the rope to trail in either of the salt lines. He'd rammed a spike into a piece of cork to give it a handle and he'd threaded it through his belt loop. Now he hooked the handle of one of the fire irons into the belt of his jeans and started securing the other end of the rope around his body.

"I need you to hold on to the rope and feed it out as I go down," he explained. "Don't let it touch the salt if you can help it. The salt will keep the spirits away from you and they shouldn't be able to use the Impala as a weapon, but keep your irons at the ready and keep an eye out for projectiles. Not a lot you can do about those except duck and block."

"What's wrong with this picture?" Dean asked.

"What?"

Dean was gazing at Sam from under arched eyebrows. "You're gonna make me say this, aren't you?"

Sam shook his head, uncomprehending.

"Out of the two of us, who weighs the least and who's the one with the upper body strength?" Dean elaborated. "Why are you the one going down?"

"Dean – "

"No, I get it. You think you're giving me the safest job but, let's face it, the easiest way to drop the guy on the rope is to attack the guy holding it, so we're both targets here. We may as well be smart about it. There's nothing that complicated about the actual salt and burn bit that I couldn't manage it, is there?"

Sam hesitated, but Dean's logic was hard to fault. "Have you ever done any rock climbing?" he asked.

"Mmm . . ." Dean shrugged. "Back in the boy scouts."

"You were a scout?"

Dean grinned. "Do you want me to show you my boondoggle?"

Sam rolled his eyes, but transferred the irons to Dean's belt and started tying the rope around his body. "The rope itself is impregnated with salt so it'll act as a protective circle while you have it round you but, as I say, you still have to watch out for projectiles," Sam explained. "Just be careful, Dean," he breathed as he handed him the duffel bag without meeting his gaze. He didn't want Dean to see the concern and anxiety he felt.

As Dean hitched the bag over his shoulders Sam called his cell and Dean inserted his earphones.

"Stay in touch the whole time," Sam cautioned him.

"Gotcha."

The first part of the climb was straightforward – just a matter of finding footholds and handholds but they were reasonably abundant. A couple of times a loose boulder would give Dean an anxious moment but it quickly taught him to test his footing more carefully before putting his weight on it. He was soon getting the hang of it and making good progress.

"How's it going, Dean?" Sam asked.

"Just call me Spiderman. Any sign of Frank and Jessie, yet?"

The silence that greeted the question indicated another pop culture reference had gone over Sam's head. _I'm wasted on him_, Dean thought.

"Still seems quiet at the moment," Sam assured him, though it would have been more reassuring if he hadn't used the word _seems_. As if to illustrate the point the EMF monitor chose that moment to start buzzing excitedly in the duffel bag.

"Sam . . ." He was ashamed to hear the nervousness in his voice, aware that Sam could probably hear it too. "Your gismo's squawking."

"Yeah. Just stop where you are and stay sharp." Sam's voice was unnaturally calm and Dean didn't find it nearly as comforting as Sam was obviously trying to make it. The next moment however he felt the tension on the rope around him tighten perceptibly and he found that an inexpressibly reassuring reminder of the physical connection between them, and it sent an unspoken message: Sam had his back.

He tightened his grip on the rock face and double checked his footholds then Sam spoke again and this time he could hear the agitation in his voice.

"Dean, are you ok?"

"Yeah I'm – _Crap_." His flesh became chilled, and when his breath started to come out of his mouth in an icy fog it confirmed Dean's suspicion that he was royally boned. The hair on the back of his neck was prickling again and he started to get that feeling you get when you're watching a horror movie and you just _know_ the monster is right behind the hero.

"Dean?"

He was afraid to look.

The rope tightened a little more. "Dean?"

He took a deep breath and turned his head.

"GUH!"

"Dean!"

He'd almost lost his footing but he'd made a grab for the rock face and held on and now he was clinging to it, flat against the rock, with his eyes tight shut. _Oh yeah, THAT'S smart! _He forced himself to open his eyes and stared at the ghastly vision of Daniel Whitman. The once handsome young face was now a macabre parody of itself, the features gaunt, flesh glossy with the pallor of death, lips cracked and bloodless. The eyes were the worst: dark and sunken, with milky irises leeched of colour, they were devoid of humanity - hollow and empty yet, paradoxically, filled with malice. If the eyes are the mirrors of the soul then what Dean saw reflected there . . . He swallowed. Thin, icy fingers crawled over his body and grasped at his flesh.

"Got a visitor," he told Sam in a low, trembling growl.

"Yeah." Sam's unsurprised tone made Dean wonder what was going on up top. "Can you reach it?"

_Reach it? _ Dean was staring at a freaking _ghost_! He couldn't frickin' move!

Dean swallowed again and cleared his throat. "Sam, I need you to tell me something," he croaked. Man, the way that thing was just standing there staring at him was _fucking _unnerving. "I need you to tell me they're more afraid of us than we are of them."

There was a pause then Sam said "if they're attacking us, it means they're afraid," he said.

"Ok," Dean murmured. "Good to know."

Slowly he made his hand move. Reaching down, he unhooked the fire iron from his belt.

. . .

On the other side of the salt circle, one of the brothers was staring at Sam. It wasn't the one pictured in the news column, Daniel, so it had to be Saul. At present the spirit wasn't doing anything, just staring. Sam braced his weight against the rope and secured his stance. He glanced down at the fire iron, but attacking the spirit would mean compromising his grip on the rope. So long as the spirit wasn't forcing a confrontation he was more concerned with keeping Dean secure. But then he heard a crack of wood behind him. "_Crap_," he breathed and glanced backwards. The spirit was breaking down a branch from a tree. He readied himself to take evasive action.

"Got incoming up here," he warned Dean. "Make sure you've got a good grip on something." The next moment the branch soared toward him and he ducked just as it whizzed past his head. Dean yelled in his ear and he immediately braced himself against the rope once more. In the next moment, the apparition in front of him fizzled and disappeared.

. . .

The rope slackened just as Dean took his swipe. He lost his grip on the rock and nearly dropped the iron as his body swung precariously out from the rock face. "Whoa!" he yelled, grabbing for the rope, and was relieved to feel it tighten once more. He swung himself back against the rock bringing the iron swooping around with him. It sliced through the apparition and hit the rock behind with a metallic ring and a small shower of sparks as the spirit disappeared with an electrical sounding "fzz".

Dean flattened himself against the wall gasping and panting, but as soon as he'd recovered his breath he let out a wild whoop of excitement. "Sam, I got the freak!" he yelled.

He could hear Sam laughing with relief at the other end. "Go Dean!" he cried.

Dean grinned broadly. "One to team Winchester!"

"Ahem! Shouldn't that be _Campbell_ and Winchester," Sam objected.

"Hey, I scored the touchdown!" Dean pointed out, self-importantly. "Be glad you made the team!"

"Ok, Dean, we need to work quickly now," Sam told him, " . . . without being reckless about it," he added as an afterthought, and then "Be careful, Dean."

"Hey, don't worry, Sammy," Dean assured him as he started spidering down the rock face once more. "Careful is my middle name."

Sam didn't verbalize a response but Dean heard a sound that expressed doubt.

Honestly, Dean was eager to get the climb and the rest of the job over with as quickly as possible. The sooner it was done the less opportunity the Gruesome Twosome would have to bother him and Sam. Still he recognized that it was probable they would attack again soon and, sure enough, about half way down to the bottom of the gully he stepped onto a narrow ledge and once again found himself opposed by the spectre of Daniel Whitman. This time, however, the spirit was keeping its distance. _They were learning._

"Smiley's back," Dean informed Sam. " . . . Sam?"

There was no response but a series of grunts and gasps.

"Sam? . . . What's going on?"

Still no answer. Clearly Sam was busy, and Dean felt his stomach muscles tighten with anxiety. He could feel the rope tightening, slackening and jerking by turns. Sam was under attack, and all Dean could do was wait helplessly to know the outcome. A particularly loud grunt and a yell in his ear made Dean instinctively look up, even though he was unable to see what was happening. When he turned his attention back to Daniel the grisly features were leering straight into his face.

With a startled yell he lost his grip on the rock, his feet slid off the ledge and his body dropped. And as he made a frantic grab for the rope it dropped right along with him. It felt like he was falling through his own insides and all he could think was _what the fuck's happened to Sam?_

. . .

Saul's attack was relentless. It was mostly a continuous barrage of leaves, dust, twigs and any litter that happened to be lying around the road, interspersed with uprooted clods of earth, but these were just distractions from the more dangerous missiles. Sam dodged a succession of broken branches before a small rock almost hit him in the head. Avoiding the rock wrong footed him and, at the same moment, a large branch hit him in the small of the back. He was knocked flat, and he measured his length out across the ground . . . over the salt line. This was the opportunity Saul had been waiting for and he leapt on Sam the moment the line was broken. Icy fingers speared straight through Sam's skull, chilling his brain. The rope was whizzing through his loose hands, rope burn a minor irritation compared to the blinding pain in his head, but he gritted his teeth and tightened his grip once more. Through the agonizing waves he became conscious that he could no longer feel Dean's weight against the rope and alarm added to his pain. Then the pain was gone, and so was Saul, but there was a sudden jerk on the rope and the next moment it felt like he was clinging to Dean's whole, dead weight and it was dragging him swiftly across the grass, toward the edge of the gully.

. . .

The jagged edges of rocks snagged at Dean's clothes and grazed burning furrows in his flesh, but his flailing arms and legs found no purchase until the strap of his duffel bag caught on a rocky outcrop and tightened around his throat. So now he wasn't falling any more, just choking. But at least the interruption in his descent was giving him the opportunity to find a foothold. Splaying out his legs, he managed to wedge his feet against the rock on either side of him and use it to lever himself upward, swinging up an arm to wrap it around the rock that had snagged his bag. He'd barely gained a grip with his fingers when Daniel's grim visage was thrust in his face once more. But, this time, Dean wasn't allowing himself to be intimidated since it seemed that, so long as he had the salt soaked rope around him, intimidate was all Daniel _could_ do to him.

He reached for the fire iron but was dismayed to find he no longer had it; it must have been dislodged from his belt during his fall. He still had the iron spike, but he couldn't reach it with his free hand. He felt for the rope instead and was relieved to discover he could feel Sam at the other end of it once more.

"Sam!" he called.

No answer. He realized the earphones were no longer in his ears; the headset was dangling free from the cell-phone on his trouser-belt. He wrapped the rope around his free arm and gripped it tight then he let go of the rock and made a grab for the spike.

"Eat iron, Fugly!" he yelled, thrusting the spike into Daniel's leering features.

Then he was slithering down the rock face once more, but he wasn't free-falling this time. He could feel Sam's weight on the other end of the rope but it was no longer anchoring him. Rather, he appeared to be pulling Sam down with him! His eyes widened in alarm and he snatched frantically at the rock, but his fingers only seemed to find loose shale and he achieved nothing except to bloody his fingernails. Then his foot jarred painfully against something solid and his momentum thrust him sharply out from the rock. His arms wind-milled madly as he was propelled backwards. The next moment the breath was knocked out of his body as he felt the impact of solid earth beneath him. He'd reached the bottom of the gully.

As soon as he'd recovered his senses he fished for the headset and plugged the earphones back in. "Sam!" he gasped. "Sam, can you hear me?"

Ragged gasps greeted his call at the other end then Sam cried "Dean! What's going on down there?"

"Well, the big news is that I just spiked DW again," Dean announced as he struggled to his feet. He didn't mention that he now appeared to have lost the spike _and _the fire iron. "That's two," he continued as he made a hasty search for his weapons on the gully floor. "How's it going up there?"

"Salt line's been compromised," Sam admitted grimly as he levered himself up from his precarious position head and shoulders over the edge of the gully. "Saul's disappeared again, though. I think it's interesting that he vanished both times you attacked Daniel. It suggests they come as a package. That could work in our favour. They're working as a team, which makes them more dangerous, but it also makes them vulnerable. What hurts one hurts the other, too. We can use that against them."

"Well, that's something." Dean spotted the spike a few feet away. No sign of the fire iron as yet. "I'm at the bottom, by the way," he added as he retrieved the spike, limping slightly on his strained ankle – same leg that Sam had spiked the previous night he noted with irritation.

Sam paid out some extra rope to give Dean some room to manoeuvre then wrapped a protective loop around himself. He noticed ruefully that they were close to reaching the end of the rope. "I don't suppose you can see a car or some bones from where you're standing?" he asked with little optimism.

Dean did a quick 360 but didn't spot anything . . . except the fire iron, under a thicket a few feet away. He limped over to the bushes and as he bent over to pick up the iron the ground gave out under his feet.

The rope almost garrotted Sam at the middle. He was yanked forward and found himself stumbling toward the edge of the gully once more but he grabbed the rope and leaned his weight against it, digging his feet into the ground, and managed to stay his progress toward the edge.

"Dean?" he yelled.

Dean was dangling over the edge of a precipice that the bushes had obscured but, despite his predicament, he was congratulating himself on having managed to keep his hold on the fire iron. Reaching out with it he thrust the hooked end into the roots of one of the bushes and, once he was satisfied its hold was secure, he used it to help lever himself back up onto solid ground. Then he peered back down into the rift he'd inadvertently discovered.

"I'm good," he reassured Sam. "I've found something: another trench. Didn't see it before 'cause it's surrounded by vegetation. I'm thinking it looks like the kind of hole a car might fall into and not get noticed for a while," he added with a self-satisfied smirk he wished Sam could see.

"Use the scanner," Sam suggested. "See if you can pinpoint a cold spot."

The duffel bag was looking a little worse for wear after its trip down the rock face but it still had everything in it. Dean took out the infra-red thermo-scanner pointed it down into the trench and started adjusting the dials as Sam had shown him in his pre-hunt prep talk. Pencil thin beams of light streaked out from the instrument and sliced backwards and forwards across the rift, finally coming to a focus at a point at the bottom, some thirty metres to his right. "Yahtzee," he breathed. "Think I've got something," he added a little louder for Sam's benefit.

"Can you see it?"

Even without the obstruction of the bushes it was hard to see the floor of the trench. The early morning light wasn't yet reaching into its depths. Dean took out the flashlight and shone it along the gap but it yielded little but obscure shadows. Shining the beam straight down he tried to make out the bottom.

"Think I'm going to have to go down and take a look-see. How much rope do we have left?"

"About fifteen feet. Will it be enough?"

Dean grimaced. It was hard to judge but, frankly, he doubted it. "Maybe. Gotta give it a try, anyway."

"Ok, wait." Sam did another sweep with the phone camera. There was no sign of Saul, but he knew he could be back any moment. There was little choice but to continue, though, so he unwrapped the coil from around his body, drew in the slack and prepared to feed the rope for Dean once more. Dean commenced the climb down the lower gully and as he continued his descent Sam felt a growing sense of unease. What were the brothers waiting for? He paid out the rest of the length until, finally, the rope was stretching directly from the back of the Impala.

When Dean reached the end of his rope there was, as he feared, still some distance beneath him. He took out the flashlight and shone it into the depths again. How far was that? Fifteen, twenty feet? Far enough to have to drop, particularly with a dodgy ankle, but what choice did he have?

"Dean, what's your status?" Sam asked.

"My what?" Who did Sam think he was? Captain Cool from Special Ops?

"I mean how far – "

"Yeah, not far." Dean lifted the fire iron from his waist, took a breath then dropped it, gritting his teeth grimly when he heard a faint ring a couple of moments later. "I think I can jump it." Lifting the duffel bag from his shoulders he dropped it after the iron.

"Dean wait – "

"It's that or give up and go back, isn't it, Sam?" He began working on untying Sam's knots . . . a challenging task in itself

"Once you take off the rope you'll be exposed to attack," Sam reminded him.

"I'm aware."

Sam blew out a worried breath and scanned the area with his camera, fire iron at the ready. Dean gripped the end of the rope, pushed out with his foot, swung free of the rock face and dropped. He felt the impact of his feet against the ground an instant later, but he also felt the fire of the end of a branch raking up his back causing him to twist and land awkwardly. "SON OF A BITCH!" He yelled as pain spiked through his ankle and up his leg. Instinctively he rolled onto his back and there above him, silhouetted against the sky, was the face of Daniel Whitman. Icy fingers plunged into Dean's chest and the grip tightened around his heart, numbing him with a freezing agony that stopped his breath.

. . .

"Dean?" No answer. Sam glanced at his cell. The call had dropped out. "CRAP!" He spun in anxious circles, scanning with his camera until the image of Saul Whitman appeared in front of him, some feet away. He lunged toward it, brandishing the iron, but it vanished before he reached it, and then the barrage of projectiles began again. It drove him backwards until, as he took a step behind he felt the rope slide under his heel then his other foot snagged against it and he toppled to the ground, the fire iron flying out of his grasp as he fell. Saul was on him in an instant and the frozen fire burned in his brain once more. Briefly he was immobilized but then he forced himself to act through the pain, reaching for the spike that was still looped through his belt. His shaking fingers closed around it, pulled, then drove upwards and Saul's image sparked and disappeared.

Gasping and near to retching, Sam crawled to the edge of the gully. "Dean . . ." he gasped. Summoning his effort he tried again and yelled into the gully. "DEAN!"

Dean was coughing and heaving, too. He heard Sam's call, faintly, but it took him several moments to regain enough breath to shout back an acknowledgement. A check of his cell confirmed there was no signal. So he was cut off and alone, in the bottom a ravine, hunting homicidal ghosts, in the dark. He struggled to his feet, wincing as he tested his weight on the injured ankle. It wasn't broken, just sprained. "Well, hey, you wouldn't want this to be easy, would you?" he snarled as he gathered up the fire iron and the duffel bag, took out the torch, and started to limp his way along the bottom of the rift.

By this time the whole thing had become a little surreal, so he was actually quite stunned when he reached the end of the cutting and found himself staring at the wreckage of a car. "Well, I'll be damned," he murmured.

Sam had cautioned him of the dangers of setting fire to an old car wreck, so he took out the salt, accelerant and cigarette lighter and left the duffel bag at a safe distance before edging warily forward. When he was close enough to see inside the car, what he found sent a chill skittering down his spine: two skeletons, in the front seat, locked together in a macabre embrace.

Dean was just thinking that it almost seemed a shame to break up the party when Daniel appeared in front of him and he crumpled to the ground as, once again, cold fingers stabbed into his chest. Then they were gone as Daniel's image twitched and blinked out. Dean just had time to gather himself before it reformed in front of him then it was gone again just as quickly. Dean frowned. What was going on?

But there was no time for reflection. Dean used the respite to start pouring the salt over the bones. The next moment he was fighting for breath once more with Daniel's deadly grip around his heart, then he heard the now familiar fizzle sound and the apparition was gone again. What the fuck was Sam doing up there?

This time he had enough time to finish salting the bones and he poured over the accelerant, but just as he was reaching for the lighter he was thrown bodily backwards and landed heavily against the bole of a tree. Daniel was in his face again, and Dean felt the agonizing clutch of his fingers, and this time he wasn't going away.

But Dean was too close to putting a permanent end to this asshole to let the creep get the better of him now. Fighting through the waves of pain he flicked open the lighter and felt the singe of its flame against his fingers. If he could only aim true . . . if the flame would only stay lit . . .

He closed his eyes and threw the lighter . . . and prayed.

. . .

Saul was back, but he wasn't making the mistake of getting too close to Sam, and Sam wasn't going to be drawn into another pointless lunge either. Instead he bent down and reached into the remains of the salt line. Scooping up a handful he threw it at the image, which promptly disappeared. It bought a little time but it wasn't as effective as iron and the spirit soon returned. Sam cursed under his breath as he swept up another scoop of salt and propelled it at his attacker. _Surely_ there must be an easier way to fight an angry spirit than this.

When Saul came back for the third time Sam took aim with the iron spike and propelled it into the centre of the apparition. That should have given them a reasonable respite, but Sam was shocked at how quickly the spirit renewed its energies, and its attack. Dean must be close to his quarry; rage and fear was making the brothers stronger. Sam was just retrieving the iron spike when he was lifted up and flung against the Impala. His head cracked against the fender and he fell to the ground, stunned. He saw Saul's face close to his and, once more, the icy fingers clawed his into brain. Sam could feel Saul's fear and savage rage. The pain in his skull was unendurable; he was slipping into darkness, but before he lost consciousness he heard a cold spectral voice in his head. "He'll turn you into a monster," Saul told him in a chilling whisper, "and then he'll condemn you for it."

. . .

Dean would have held his breath, if he had any to hold, but as one moment then another passed the pain was overcoming him, and he could feel consciousness slipping away from him, but then he became aware of red light flickering in the periphery of his vision and Daniel's image faltered in front of him. The spirit's rage was palpable. Dean hadn't thought the pain could get any worse but it did, and then a voice spoke in his ear.

"He'll betray you," Daniel hissed. "You'll give up everything you have for him, and then he'll abandon you!" Then he snarled as corrosive red fire began to consume him, eating at his form until he screamed, shrieked and was gone. Dean stared wide eyed, panting and gasping, into the empty space that the spirit had left. Then he turned over and vomited.

Ahead of him the flames were growing in intensity, finding fuel in the upholstery. The old familiar fascination gripped Dean as he sat up and watched them leaping and licking into the air, but now it was laced with an unspeakable horror and the recollection he kept trying to deny. The fire danced in his eyes as he stared at it transfixed, then suddenly it exploded in a wild angry ball and a hot gust knocked Dean onto his back. He struggled back into a sitting position just in time to see a line of yellow-blue flame streaking toward him. Some instinct of self-preservation sped his thought processes and he mentally connected the flame's progress to the can of accelerant lying next to him.

"FUCK!" he yelled, leaping sideways just in time to see the can go up with a _WOOF_ sound, like the punch-line of a bad joke. He was just gasping with relief when he smelled burning denim and felt searing heat against his leg. It would amaze him afterward, when he thought back to it, how quickly he got his shirt off and doused the flames. Without a doubt, the speed of his reactions had saved his life. But, in that moment, all he could think about was that his jeans were ruined. In that moment, he cared less about the pain in his scorched leg – the same _fucking _leg – his injured ankle, the still throbbing ache in his chest, or the myriad cuts, grazes and bruises he'd sustained on the climb down.

He staggered to his feet and supported himself with his hands on his thighs as he bent over and fought with the sting behind his tightly closed eyelids. "It's just a pair of jeans," he reasoned with himself. "It's _just_ a pair of jeans." But it was his _last_ pair of jeans, one of those few items of clothing that had survived the fire with him, and he felt like the flames were pursuing him still, greedy to finish the job off.

Distantly he heard a voice calling to him and, after a beat, recognized it as Sam's. He struggled to regain composure and tried to call back but his voice came out thin and wispy. He swallowed, vented a harsh growl into the empty air then stood up straight and yelled "I'm good, Sam! You ok?" The reply was indecipherable but the tone sounded kind of positive.

The job wasn't quite over yet. The fire was still raging and the vegetation around it was starting to catch. Dean limped over to where he'd left the duffel bag and took out the fire extinguisher. Now that the flames had served their purpose he could set about snuffing them out.

He still felt the old pull as he neared the flames, the urge to get too close. How many times did he have to get burned before he learned the lesson? Grimly, he lifted the extinguisher and aimed the nozzle at the fire. He'd all but emptied the whole canister before the last of the flickering tongues was doused.

Then it was a mere matter of finding where he'd left the end of the rope and climbing fifteen or so feet of sheer rock face freehand, and with an injured leg, to reach it. As it happened, it wasn't as bad as he'd thought. Light was beginning to reach the bottom of the cutting as he returned to the place where he'd climbed down and, now he could see the rope, it turned out that it was only about ten feet from the rift floor. Nevertheless, climbing up to it was difficult and painful and the blessed relief he felt when he finally reached it, tied it around his waist, and felt the pull of Sam's strength at the other end, lifting him, was beyond words.

And _hellfire! _Sam _was_ strong. Dean was doing little more than guiding himself upward, Sam was doing the rest. When he finally reached the top of the gully he reached out an arm and felt Sam's powerful grip close around his wrist raising him up. And as he stumbled up to stand beside him Dean was just so fucking glad to see him again, and to stand on level ground, and just to be fucking _alive_, that he practically fell into Sam's arms and gripped him with a bear hug that would have squeezed the breath out of a less solidly built man.

He could feel Sam's body stiffen with shock, dismay and discomfort until he was as rigid as one of his own fire irons, and his arms were kind of flailing like he didn't know what to do with them, but tough tits. He was just going to have to deal with it because Dean wasn't about to let go, leastways until he had his swimming eyes and the lump in his throat under control. Eventually Sam's arms circled Dean's shoulders and he did that patting thing men do when they're trying to make a hug seem more macho, and which has the unspoken subtext "please let go now; you're embarrassing me". Dean relented and drew away, giving Sam's head a semi-rough push as he did so, just to reassure Sam that everything was cool and manly after all, and he wasn't about to suggest they took a shower together or anything – though, it had to be said, they both needed one.

As Dean stepped back Sam's gaze registered shock as he took in Dean's battered, torn, smoked and scorched appearance. Dean returned an innocent and quizzical look as if he didn't know what Sam's problem was, a look that _dared_ Sam to make a comment. Sam spent a moment absorbing Dean's expression then asked, casually "So, did you have any trouble down there?"

Dean wrinkled his nose and pursed his lips. "Nah." Then, "Oh! . . . I lost your lighter. Sorry," he added as an afterthought.

Sam stared at him for a moment then clicked his tongue. "I can get another," he sighed as he picked up the duffel bag and started heading back to the Impala with it.

Dean limped a couple of steps in silence, then he growled "Next time _I'll _hold the rope."

Sam's laugh was like summer rain.

They leaned against the hood of the Impala and just sat there together laughing for a minute or two.

"We should have brought some beer along," Dean remarked.

Sam shook his head and swept his tongue across the inside of his cheek. "We'll remember that next time," he agreed.

"Oh!" Dean remembered suddenly. He reached round his neck and pulled Sam's weird necklace thing up over his head and held it out to Sam. "I guess you'll be wanting this back, now," he said.

Sam looked taken aback. "No . . ." He frowned. "It's yours. To keep."

Dean's eyebrows lifted and his lips parted softly " . . . w . . . b . . . but didn't you say it was valuable or something?"

Sam shook his head. "I said it was unique. I'm not aware it has any monetary value. Besides . . ." His face broke into a broad, dimpled grin, "you ganked your first monsters today. Consider it . . . a hazing gift."

"Really?" Dean gazed with delight at the strange . . . oddly familiar . . . carved head. "Are you sure?"

Sam nodded, smiling. "Yeah, I'm sure."

Dean slipped the cord back around his neck and dropped the amulet back in place on his chest. "Thank you, Sam. I love it."

Silence descended and became a little awkward. This was turning into too much of a chick-flick moment and Dean couldn't resist having a bit of fun with it. Reaching out and grabbing Sam's head he planted a big, wet, sloppy kiss on his cheek. Sam leapt off the hood of the Impala and almost fell over in his hurry to get away.

"Dean, what the fuck . . . ?" he yelped.

"Ah, suck it up, Bitch," Dean told him, grinning. "Take it like a man."

Sam stared at Dean mystified; he really didn't know how to take him sometimes, his behaviour was so . . . inappropriate . . . and why did he keep calling Sam a bitch? How was _that_ appropriate? But from the cheerful way Dean was grinning at him it was clear he was supposed to take the shot in good spirits . . . . . . Was he supposed to shoot back? . . . He tested the premise.

"Jerk!" he spluttered.

Dean continued to grin, if anything, even more broadly.

Well, apparently so. Sam shook his head again, then picked up the duffel bag and headed back to the trunk with it. He emptied it and was arranging everything in order in the trunk when Dean limped up beside him and started idly pulling things out and examining them. He picked up a shotgun, checked it, cracked it open and stared down the barrels. Sam patiently took it out of his hands and put it back where it belonged before continuing organizing the cache. Next Dean picked up a box of ammo and started examining the cartridges.

"So, salt . . ." he said suddenly, out of the blue, " . . . effective against a variety of your common or garden monsters, right?"

Sam agreed and held out his hand for the ammo box. Dean placed it in his hand and he returned it to its place in the cache.

"Ok, well, don't laugh if this is a stupid idea . . . after all, what would I know?" he continued. "But could you make ammunition out of it?"

Sam was about to dismiss the idea, but then he thought about it and he suddenly realized . . . _rock salt_! He had to laugh. If he hadn't he would have cried. He imagined people must have felt like this the first time someone asked "would it be easier to push if we put something round under it?"

"Ok, so it's stupid," Dean grumbled.

"No! No, it's not!" Sam gasped hastily. "It's _not_ a stupid idea, Dean."

Dean raised his eyebrows. He looked like an excited child. "It would work?"

Sam grinned. "I think it might." _Dean Winchester, you strange, brave, ridiculous, brilliant, infuriating, beautiful man. I so want to kiss you._

Dean pursed his lips happily and gave a smug little toss of his head before limping back to the front of the Impala and climbing into the passenger seat. Sam climbed in beside him and took the wheel. As he started the car Dean turned the radio on and was about to push the cassette tape into the slot, but he listened to the beat of the song that was playing for a moment and hesitated.

"Hmmph," he grunted. "Maybe a bit C&W for the Impala, but it's one of their rockier numbers . . . and you can't argue with Joe Walsh's guitar work, now can you?"

Sam shrugged. Whoever Joe Walsh was.

Dean let the radio play and after a moment he started clapping and singing along to it.

"_Somebody's gonna hurt someone_," he crooned, "_before the night is through._

_ "Somebody's gonna come undone. There's nothing we can do_ . . ."

He continued to sing in high spirits, and when the chorus came he started to air guitar along with it as well. Sam glanced at him uneasily. It struck him that this excessively cheerful mood was unnatural, and he worried that when the adrenalin rush of the hunt wore off Dean was going to crash and burn. Apprehension started to stew in his insides. Sam was convinced his emotionally volatile friend was heading for a melt down, and he knew he was ill-equipped to deal with it. He just prayed that when the time came some inspiration would guide him and he'd say and do the right things, but the words that seemed to answer him from the radio were far from comforting.

"_There's gonna be a heartache tonight, heartache tonight, I know_,"Dean sang along, his fingers sliding up and down the imaginary frets. "_There's gonna be a heartache tonight, heartache tonight, I know. Let's go!_

"_Well, we can beat around the bushes;_

_ We can get down to the bone_

_ We can leave it in the parkin' lot,_

_ But either way, there's gonna be a,_

_ Heartache tonight, a heartache tonight I know._

_ I know, there'll be a heartache tonight_

_ A heartache tonight I know. Whoa._

. . .

Break my heart . . ."


	20. The Never Ending Road Scene 11

Green wasn't his colour. Maybe you'd think it would be, but it wasn't. Not this shade of green, anyway. Dean was a winter, and this green was . . . spring or something. Anyway, it didn't suit his skin tones. It made him look sallow and pasty. Well, that's what you get when you let another man dress you.

Ok, that was a bit of an exaggeration. After all, it was only a t-shirt and a pair of joggers, and he appreciated he needed a change of clothes, and it was more practical to let Sam dash in and grab him something than to alarm the staff and customers of K-mart by limping in himself with his, admittedly, rather grisly appearance.

Trouble was, it was _always_ easier to let Sam do everything for him and, if Dean wasn't careful, it was going to become a habit. Sam with his seemingly endless mental to-do-list that he was continually checking off, so methodically, never at a loss for what needed to be done next – he made sure Dean was fed, watered, clothed, showered (all right, he'd let Dean do _that_ for himself), but he'd dressed his wounds afterward, smearing him with 57 varieties of his weirdo herbal witch-doctor crap. It was sweet, sort of, he supposed, the way Sam took care of him. But it was kind of weird, too. It had to be said, Sam was a tad controlling.

And now he was doing Dean's laundry for him. All right, he was doing _their _laundry for them. But what was he going to do when it was finished? Would he fold Dean's boxers for him? That just wasn't _right_ . . . and he _would, _wouldn't he? Sam would fold everything. Hell, Dean wouldn't put it past him to _iron_ everything! It was like he was turning into Dean's mother or someth –

Dean's breath caught in his chest. The next moment he was fighting the urge to heave and a thin, cold film of sweat coated his skin. He splashed some cold water on his face and dried it off, finished brushing his teeth, spat, and returned to the other room picking up his guitar on the way to the bed. He dropped onto the mattress half sitting, half lying, with the guitar over his lap. He lay there for a while with his eyes closed, idly strumming chords. It wasn't long before they started falling into the pattern of his 'mythic quest' song.

"_Hey, tall stranger knocking at my door,  
><em>_In the middle of the night. What you want me for?  
><em>_Why d'you walk into my life, knock me to the floor – "_

Was that really only . . . . four nights ago? It felt like he and Sam had been together forever. So much had happened since then . . .

It was incredible, when you thought about it, how easily and naturally he'd placed his life in the hands of a man he'd known only three days.

_He'll betray you_. _You'll give up everything you have for him, and then he'll abandon you_.

That was ridiculous. That didn't even make sense. That was just stupid ghost talk: a fucked up, angry spirit crapping on about its own fucked up, angry life. It had nothing to do with Dean, or Sam, or anything.

Dean shook his head and concentrated on the music, the chords, the frets . . .

_"There's a crossroads coming in your life,  
><em>_And your fate's gonna turn on the point of a knife.  
><em>_He sang 'Hey, brother, come away with me.  
><em>_Let me take you, let me show you how it's gotta b _. . .'"

He felt a chilly trickle of unease down his back. Now that _was _spooky.

_Dean, have you never experienced anything out of the ordinary yourself before now? No odd dreams? Premonitions?_

Oh, bull. It's just a coincidence.

_Most people have had brushes with the supernatural, they just don't recognize it. They pass it off as imagination or try to rationalize it with some natural explanation_.

Shuttup.

Dean moved into the bridge and tried to play the interlude, but it didn't sound right without an amp. He couldn't even plug it into the laptop; Sam had brought the guitar but not the leads and peripherals . . . something else Sam had done for him. Along with all the stuff he'd brought from the house, including the photographs – now _that _was thoughtful. There were different sides to Sam, he appreciated that, but hunter-Sam was positively Machiavellian. He was completely goal-driven. He'd hacked into Dean's laptop without so much as a by-your-leave, he treated the Impala as if it was his own: he never asked Dean if he could drive it, he _told_ him. And he'd taken over the trunk and turned the car into his monster mobile . . . and half the weaponry was Dad's and Dad had kept that locked up, so that means Sam had broken in . . .

Dean didn't doubt that Sam had done what he thought was necessary, or that he had Dean's best interests at heart, but it was a damn good job he did because you wouldn't want to be on the wrong side of a man like that, would you?

A _tad_ controlling? Sam had taken over his life! He'd organized the business with Stan, delegated his mum's funeral arrangements to her family . . .

Dean's breath hitched again , and now his eyes were stinging as well. He shook his head fiercely.

Sam had relieved Dean of the worry of these things when he wasn't mentally ready to deal with them . . . but maybe Dean _should_ have dealt with them . . . people were going to wonder why he wasn't at his own mother's funeral. He _should_ have been there. He _would _have been if they hadn't been running from . . .

What _were_ they running from? Sam still hadn't told him, but he'd seemed to know . . . or have some idea, at least. He'd said Dean was in danger, that he was a target . . . He said he didn't know where Dad was . . . but he'd acknowledged he was in trouble, though he thought he was probably alive . . . Dean slowly laid the guitar down by the side of the bed, swung his legs round and sat up. _There _it was.

Dean's breathing was shallow and his flesh buzzed with the dread of the thing that he knew was right behind him, the thing he'd kept seeing out of the corner of his eye but been afraid to turn and look at. Sam _knew_ something. He just wasn't telling Dean. What was he keeping back? This was a man who talked casually of fighting shape-shifters and vampires, who'd called the spirits they'd just fought together "a basic salt and burn" and thought this a suitable case for Dean to cut his teeth on. What could Sam possibly still be afraid to tell Dean? What would _Sam_ run from?

He felt the hairs on the back of his neck rising once more as his gaze fell on Sam's back-pack. As he searched for the journal his hand lighted on Sam's bottle of holy water first. He pushed it to one side, but then picked it up and looked at it again. He was remembering something: a faceful of water, right before Sam had jumped him . . . _what _had Sam expected to be fighting?

"Oh _no_!" he whispered, sinking down into a chair with the book before him on his knees. "_No no no no _. . ." It fell open at the page he'd turned down. "That can't . . . there can't _really_ be . . ."

Dean studied the pages in front of him with a horror that was nauseating. Just the day before he had joked of demons, ghosts and vampires as if they were all the same thing, but they _weren't_ the same. The monsters Sam had talked about, the creatures he'd catalogued in his journal up to this point, were just that: creatures - animals, or perverted, maimed forms of humanity. They were motivated by basic instincts, like the need to survive, feed, reproduce – or basic emotions you could wrap your head around like anger or fear, even love that had become twisted by rage and hate and frustration. These were things Dean could understand, things you could fight. But a demon was a whole different order of _supernatural_. This was something that hurt and killed and destroyed _just for the sake of it_ – just for the sheer pleasure of causing pain and devastation. It wasn't even of this world. It came from . . . somewhere that couldn't possibly _exist_. Even to contemplate it was unthinkable. This was beyond monstrous. It was _evil_. How could you fight that? To fight it was to set yourself against the place it came from, against the _source_ of that evil.

Dean didn't want to fight that. He didn't want to believe in it. He wanted to run, run home and climb into his bed, and hide under the covers shivering. But he could never go home. There was no home, no bed, and there were no covers to hide under. There was only ashes and dust.

Dean lifted his eyes to cast a fearful glance out of the window and was shocked to see bright sunlight shining in the world outside. He felt cold. It was a cold that coated his flesh, seeped through his muscles, veins and nerves, and gripped his bones. It numbed his fingers. He couldn't feel the page of the journal as he turned it. It was long moments before he could make himself see the words written there. But eventually he managed to focus and began to read a passage headed "Demon Signs and Omens":

_Indications of Demon Activity in a Locality_

_Electrical storms  
><em>_Sudden variations and/or extremes of temperature  
><em>_Cattle deaths_

_Indications of the Immediate Presence of a Demon_

_Electrical disturbances or failures  
><em>_Telekinetic events  
><em>_Smell of sulphur or sulphuric deposits._

_Tests for Demonic Possession_

_A demon will flinch at the mention of the name of God.  
><em>_A demon will have a corrosive response to holy water and/or salt._

Dean read the passage again. Then he read it a third time, and this time his nerveless finger traced a passage down the page as he slowly absorbed the information and everything it implied.

Long after Dean had ceased to focus on the writing, his finger still continued to travel the same path down the page, like a death echo mindlessly repeating the same action over and over again.


	21. The Never Ending Road Scene 12

Sam held the pile of folded laundry pinned between his forearm and his chin while he turned the room key and pushed the door open.

"Sorry I've been so long; I ran out of change for the drier," he said, sliding the pile down onto the table then dividing it between his own clothes and Dean's and something was wrong.

He couldn't have said what it was that alerted him, but something in the room was off and when he looked at Dean he felt the hammer-fall of his heart against his rib cage and the sickish chill of having his earlier misgivings confirmed. Dean was sitting with Sam's journal perched on his knees and, even at this distance and upside down, Sam could see which page Dean was reading. Except, he didn't appear to be reading it – at least, not any more – his vision was focused at a point somewhere in front of him, and Sam noticed with unease the mechanical manner in which Dean's finger kept stroking the neglected page.

Cat-like, Sam felt every nerve and muscle in his body readying for a confrontation. He felt there was a palpable tension in the room, like the dry crackle of static you can feel in the atmosphere after a long spell without rain; on the heaviest, most oppressive day when you can smell the storm coming and feel the deluge straining for release; in the moment before the thunder speaks . . .

"It was a demon, wasn't it?" Dean said quietly.

Sam didn't mistake that quiet for calm. It was hard to characterize Dean's expression as he lifted his almost demon-dark eyes to hold Sam's. It appeared impassive, but it was anything but calm.

Sam didn't know what to say. He waited for inspiration, the guidance he'd prayed for, but there was nothing. He had no idea how he could make this any better.

Dean stood up slowly, and slowly placed the journal on the table. Everything he did was slow, and Sam found himself almost unconsciously edging backwards until the top of the kitchenette jabbed into his hip.

"So, it wasn't an accident that you came to stay with us, was it Sam? You were there for a purpose. You were hunting." Dean placed his finger on the journal. "You were hunting _this_."

Sam hesitated only briefly then swallowed and nodded. "Yes." Essentially. "That's right. Yes."

Still Dean held Sam with his impassive stare, and his finger began stroking the page again. "So, you knew about it," he reiterated. "You knew it was coming for us." He took a step closer to Sam. "You _knew _. . . and you never told us, never warned any of us . . . you never said _anything_."

Dean's anger was something to behold. It was dangerous because it was pure, primal, utterly without thought for consequences or self-preservation. It couldn't be reasoned with or safely restrained. All you could do, if you were smart, was get the fuck out of its way. But Sam wasn't planning to be smart. Sam had determined to take whatever was coming because Dean had a right to it: to his pain and his rage . . . and his retribution, whatever that turned out to be - more than that, he _needed_ it – but, _Dear God,_ Sam would never have imagined he could feel as afraid of Dean as he did at this moment.

His gaze slid away from Dean's and he replied hoarsely, "I'm sorry."

But Dean's intense eyes found him again and held him from under the arch of his eyebrows.

"You're _sorry_?"

Sam swallowed on a mouth run dry. "I thought . . . I didn't think – if I tried to explain – that you'd believe me – that any of you would . . . I thought that at least if I could stay on the spot . . . I thought I could protect you all," he finished lamely. There was a silence in which Sam reached backwards for the edge of the kitchenette, to steady himself, and he could hear the sound of a clock ticking. But when Dean spoke it was still with that unnaturally quiet voice, and Sam wished he would just snap and get it over with.

"Well, you did a piss poor job of it," Dean said.

Sam's forehead tightened into a tiny frown and his jaw tightened with a slight sideways twist. _You're still alive, Dean, _a small voice wanted to protest, but he said nothing. He only had John to thank for that.

Dean finally turned his head, releasing Sam briefly from his accusing stare, as he transferred his attention back to the journal, finger resting on the page once more.

"It says here that demons act by possessing people; they act through host bodies it says . . ."

Sam's eyes widened. The hammer of his heart sped up like a piston and he drew in a sharp hard breath through his nose. _Oh, no. Don't go there. Not yet. It's too soon. You're not ready _. . .

"So, who was the host that night, Sam?"

Sam was staring like a deer caught in the headlights, and Dean was flooring the gas pedal.

"Who did the demon possess?" he demanded. When Sam still didn't respond he added. "Where were _you_ when Mom died, Sam?"

The question Dean was asking was so far from Sam's thoughts that Dean had to repeat it, and it was only when Sam registered the trace of a hysterical edge in Dean's voice that he realized it wasn't rhetorical.

"Sam! _Where were you_?"

Sam's hesitation now was simply confusion. "Y – you know where I was, Dean . . . I was with you. We were talking . . . w . . . ?"

"Before that. When she went to bed. You were upstairs. What were you doing up there?"

Sam's mouth dropped open. This possibility – this interpretation of the facts simply hadn't occurred to him.

"I . . . went to the bathroom . . ." he began, but immediately recognized that the habitual lies were no longer serving him and hurriedly added "and then I checked your mother's room, and yours. Everything seemed fine, then. I passed Amanda in the hall . . . and she was fine. That was the last time I saw her."

Dean was studying him through arched eyebrows again. "And I know that _because_ . . . ?"

Sam realized with horror that he had nothing, nothing beyond asking Dean to trust in his sincerity, and it wasn't as if he'd been unfailingly forthright up to that moment.

"Dean, it wasn't me!" he gasped. "Why would you even _think_ that?"

When Dean replied his lips and voice were shaking. The levee was beginning to break. "One day I had a perfectly normal life and the next it was a river of crap and, in between, you happened. The whole world goes fucking insane and you just happen to be there, the one person who knows something about it. What am I supposed to believe?" His eyes began to swim with helpless tears. "Come on, Sam! Throw me a bone, here! Give me a reason to believe you!"

Apparently it was an infection. Sam could feel the sting in his own eyes. "Dean," His voice was low and trembling. "It _wasn't _me."

"There were only three people in the house that night, Sam: you, me and Mom."

Sam opened his mouth then stopped as he suddenly wondered: would it be kinder to let Dean think it _was_ him?

"Sam?"

But he was going to want to know – _need_ to know – what had happened to his father. Sooner or later he was going to have to hear the truth.

Sam's fingers tightened around the rim of the kitchenette. "There was someone else."

The silence stretched out. It took so long for Dean to ask the question that Sam began to wonder whether he was afraid to hear the answer, but then he moved closer and his voice hardened.

"_Who?_" he demanded.

Sam's breath was coming short and shallow.

"_Tell me the truth, Sam!"_

His adrenalin drenched muscles were twitching, urging him to move, but Sam stood his ground. _Whatever happens _. . . _Whatever he does_ . . .

"Your father."

All the air left Dean's body. He looked down and to the side and forced another airless breath out of his mouth in a ghastly parody of a laugh, and his teeth were bared in a vicious, mirthless grin. Every nuance of his body was telegraphing his intent and Sam gripped the edge of the kitchenette, forcing himself to stillness.

And yet, when the punch came, Sam was still unprepared for the force of it. Who knew Dean's fist could pack that much power? It exploded in Sam's face and knocked him off of his feet. He would have fallen if Dean hadn't immediately followed the blow, grabbing Sam's shirt and slamming him against the wall.

"You're telling me my _father _killed my mother!" Dean snarled. "Is that what you're saying, Sam?"

Sam stood frozen against the wall. It wasn't even about letting Dean vent any more, it was about not doing anything that might provoke him further, anything that might cause the situation to snowball into something that could only end bloody.

"Dean, _no_!" he gasped. "It wasn't your father. It was the demon! Your father was possessed!" He could see Dean's body quaking, feel Dean's hands shaking against his chest. "You've experienced that, you know how it feels, you know it's out of your control!"

Sam watched the blood drain from Dean's face until his skin was tinged green and his lips were ashen. "But I knew what was happening, Sam," he barely whispered. "I knew what I was doing, I just couldn't stop . . ." Then his breath was coming in sharp gasps. "W-would Dad have known? Would he have been able to see . . . feel what he was . . . Sam?"

Dean's eyes were pleading and Sam didn't know what to say. "I don't know," he barely whispered. He cleared his throat. "Victims have reported periods of consciousness but at other times – "

Dean's grasp tightened around Sam's collar. He shook him and banged him against the wall. It was just a gesture, there was no strength left in him, but as Sam stared into Dean's eyes he knew he couldn't lie to him. He swallowed on a throat that was so tight it hurt. "I think he was conscious, Dean." His eyes hurt. His chest hurt. "I'm sorry."

Dean drew his hands back behind his head and Sam tensed in expectation of another blow, but it didn't come. Instead Dean snatched the car keys off the table, reached the door in two strides and was through it, slamming it behind him, almost before Sam had time to react.

"Dean, what – where are you – Dean, stop! Don't!" he cried, following him through the door.

Outside Dean was leaning unsteadily against the side of the Impala, then his body heaved and he doubled over and threw up over the tarmac, retching violently and repeatedly. Sam stood irresolute at first but, as he watched, Dean weakened and his legs began to buckle; he was in danger of falling into his own vomit. Sam made a move toward him, hesitated for a moment, but then stepped forward and slipped a hand under Dean's shoulder to help him support himself, and held his hair back out of his eyes with the other.

It continued painfully for long minutes as Dean emptied the contents of his stomach, then spewed bile, and still continued locked in the grip of dry heaves, coughing, gasping and hiccupping, and all Sam could do was to wait helplessly for the spasms to run their course, feeling Dean's body shudder and listening to his suffering as the smell of hot vomit rose from the cold tarmac.

A couple passed by on their way out from their own room and stared at Dean with expressions caught between disgust and concern. The woman might have been about to speak but Sam's warning glare hastened them both on their way without comment, and Dean began to cough his gag reflex under some kind of control. Then he slowly straightened up and weakly pushed Sam away.

"Get away from me," he gasped, shakily pushing the car keys into the lock.

"Dean, no!"

"I'm not kidding, Sam. Back off!" he growled.

He already had the driver side door open but Sam slammed it shut before he could get in and, pinning Dean between his own body and the side of the Impala, he grabbed his arm and held his wrist against the roof of the car. Dean struggled beneath him but his hold was secure and Dean's strength was at its lowest ebb. He spoke in Dean's ear, keeping his voice as low and calm as he could possible make it. "Dean, let go of the keys. Please. I don't want to hurt you, but I can't let you drive in this state. Dean, _please_."

Dean's struggles persisted a beat longer, then ceased, and he lay beneath Sam limp and inert. He swallowed and closed his eyes and his grip on the car keys relaxed. A part of Sam was tempted to stay close to Dean like that, to hold him and comfort him. The ease with which Dean had given up the struggle almost persuaded him that it was what Dean wanted, too. Nevertheless, as soon as he'd drawn the keys from Dean's loose fingers he stepped back. A moment later Dean opened his eyes and pushed himself upright, then he opened the car door.

"Go back inside, Sam," he insisted in a hoarse whisper then, when Sam hesitated, he repeated the command more loudly but in a voice that crumbled from trembling lips. By the time he stumbled into the car his shoulders were shaking and tears were already raining down his face.

Sam stood frozen with indecision.

"_Get inside, Sam!"_ Dean yelled once more before slamming the door, closing himself inside the Impala and slumping over the wheel.

Sam obeyed finally but, once inside the motel room, he kept watch on the Impala discreetly from behind the curtain, his anxieties only slightly mollified by the hard outline of the car keys inside his fist, and the knowledge that Dean wasn't going anywhere.

Inside the Impala Dean still felt exposed and vulnerable, and he was convinced Sam was still watching him, even from inside the motel room. Scrambling over the back of the seat he crawled into the back of the car and grabbed a blanket and cushion from behind the back seat. Stretched out across the upholstery, beneath the blanket and with his face buried in the cushion, he finally let it go, venting his grief in sobs that racked his whole body and ended in howls of anguish as he beat at the leather with his fists and kicked out at the floor and the metalwork that housed the front seat, raging against the thoughts he couldn't endure, and couldn't escape.

It was only exhaustion, not relief that ended it. When his tears had dried into salty tracks on his face though his shoulders still heaved with mute sobs then he finally pushed himself back upright and tried to draw breath with a semblance of self control. Pulling out a handkerchief he wiped at the residue of tears and snot. He gazed sightless at the sodden piece of linen for some time before his swollen eyes began to focus on a small red blur in a corner that eventually sharpened and revealed itself as a line of red stitching in the shape of an 'S'. It was the handkerchief that Sam had given him and he'd been carrying around with him ever since he'd let Alyson Holder have his. He stared dumbly at it for a few moments before his head dropped back and he let out a groan that was part confusion, part self-reproach.

"Oh, what am I _doing_?" he gasped.

He felt helpless and bewildered. His head ached and throbbed from too much . . . too much everything, and that was without trying to make sense of the conundrum that was Sam Campbell and all the conflicting thoughts Dean had had about him since he'd first started reading that damned journal. Looked at one way, it seemed that Dean had every reason to mistrust Sam: he knew next to nothing about him except that he was controlling, manipulative and evasive and he'd swept into Dean's life with nine kinds of crazy at his heels and there was no way of knowing for sure which had followed who. On the other hand, it felt like there was no excuse for doubting him when the kid had done nothing but look out for Dean from the get go, and all Dean was doing was hurting someone who actually seemed to care about his welfare . . . though why he _should_ remained a mystery.

They'd ganked angry spirits together for fuck's sake!

Dean found he still had some tears left after all, but he growled them back down inside him. He needed to think clearly. Trouble was, so often thinking only got him piles of facts with no way of choosing between them other than to go with his gut. In the end, it came down to a choice: did he trust Sam or not?

Dad had said that our choices were the only thing in life we had any control over, and Dean had the feeling this might be one of the most important he'd ever make. He found himself staring down at the brass amulet that lay against his chest. Lifting it up, he pulled the cord from around his neck and held it in his hand, studying the carving and wondering again what it was and what it meant.

In the end it came down to small things, stupid even: it was about that little upturned frown Sam got on his face, or the way he would blush sometimes, or that tight little bitch-faced purse he got to his lips when Dean wound him up; it was about the way he would try to be oh-so-serious, but then he'd crack and the dimples would show. Maybe it wasn't logical, but these were the things Dean couldn't get past. Damn it all, he _liked_ Sam.

Honestly, Dean didn't know for sure whether it was an act of faith or an act of desperation. All he knew was that everything he'd ever thought he could depend on had been swept from under his feet, and if he didn't find something to believe in he was going to go right out of his mind. He gazed at the amulet, weighing it in his hand a moment longer, then he slipped it back over his head and let it drop into place. For better or worse, he chose to believe in those dimples.

Dean felt hot and feverish. He needed a drink. And he needed a little talk with Sam. He still had a lot of questions and, damn it, Sam was going to give him some answers.


	22. The Never Ending Road   Final

When Sam saw Dean getting out of the car he made a hasty retreat from the window and sat on the end of the bed trying to look casual . . . except he realized that sitting with one hand on his hip and the other on his knee probably didn't look as casual as all that. Then he caught himself scratching behind his ear and hastily dropped his hand into his lap as Dean walked through the door.

Dean looked awful. His eyes were red and swollen, his face tear-tracked and blotchy, and his lips were bloody where he'd been biting into them. He stopped in the doorway for a moment staring and looking equally shocked to see Sam then he crossed to the sink. He looked tense but Sam was relieved to note that the rage seemed to have passed. The atmosphere in the room now was more one of awkwardness.

Dean ran the cold tap, splashed his face and dried it off with a dish towel, but it didn't improve his appearance much. He turned to look at Sam briefly but didn't seem to want to focus on him for long. He opened the refrigerator and busied himself in the icebox instead.

"You couldn't have found anything in your witch-kit to put on that?" he asked in a voice that came out hoarse and wispy.

It took Sam a moment to realize what Dean meant then his hand strayed up to his own throbbing face, and as he felt the sore and puffy flesh under his fingers it occurred to him that his own appearance might not be a lot better than Dean's.

"I hadn't thought about it," he admitted.

Dean turned from the refrigerator holding an ice tray, which he twisted and upturned into the dish towel. "No, you were too busy spying on me."

"I wasn't sp – "

Dean dropped on one knee in front of Sam and held the make-shift ice-pack against Sam's cheek. "What are you afraid will happen if you take your eyes off me for five minutes, Sam?"

Sam winced but after the initial shock of the contact wore off the coolness against his skin felt good. "The way you were when you walked out, I didn't know what you might do."

"Oh, you're worried I'm a danger to myself now?"

Sam gazed levelly at Dean. "It crossed my mind."

Their eyes met and there was a moment, a sense of connection, but then Dean grabbed Sam's hand, pressed it into place against the ice-pack and stepped back.

"Well, you can relax," Dean assured him. "I'm not ready to drive off the end of a pier just yet." He looked for a towel to dry his hand, remembered Sam had it and used the leg of his joggers instead. He gave Sam another awkward glance.

"What were you thinking, letting me do that to you?" he demanded. "Is this some kind of kinky-into-pain thing?"

"What? i_No/i_!" Sam could feel a blush creeping into his cheeks. Was Dean beginning to suspect Sam's feelings toward him? Was that why he kept making all these loaded comments?

"We both know you don't have to put up with this shit from me, Sam. You could put me in hospital as soon as breathe on me. So what gives?"

"I don't i_want/i_ to put you in hospital, Dean. You've been through hell; you were upset. I thought it was best to just let you get it out of your system."

"By using you as my punch bag? Are you freaking i_insane/i_?!"

Sam shrugged and Dean stared at him for a second. He ran a thumbnail over an eyebrow then picked up the ice-tray and brandished it at Sam reprovingly. "Don't do that again!" he insisted, before shoving the tray back in the ice-box.

Sam pursed his lips. It struck him as a positive statement, on the whole. If Dean was still laying down ground rules for their relationship that pre-supposed they still had one.

Dean pulled two beers out of the refrigerator and handed one to Sam. He cracked the top on the other, took a swig and used it as a mouthwash before spitting it out into the sink. He took a couple of long swallows before he spoke again, but when he did his voice was still coming out in a hoarse croak. Apparently he'd strained his throat while he was out in the Impala.

"Why do you care so much, Sam?" he asked. "You don't know me. A few days ago you hadn't even met me. Why have you decided to make yourself my self-appointed guardian angel?"

Sam felt heat rising into his cheeks again, and the ice was melting and starting to run down his arm in chilly rivulets. He didn't know what to say that wouldn't sound, at best, pathetic and at worst downright creepy. He wasn't going to admit that an irrational infatuation had anything to do with it, no matter what Dean suspected, and the visions were a can of worms he didn't want to open until he absolutely had to. He couldn't even explain to himself why Dean's untrammeled offer of friendship had meant so much to him. He should know better. Attachment and sentiment were the parents of error and poor judgment; they were weaknesses to be exploited. He should have learned his lesson already. And Dean wouldn't understand anyway. He'd always had a lot of friends; he was popular in his home town, he had friends at college, his girlfriend, he'd had parents who loved him . . . he'd never experienced loneliness.

Sam felt the unfamiliar sting at the corners of his eyes again and stiffened his jaw against it. What the hell was Dean doing to him? He needed to get a grip.

In the end there was only one thing he could say. Sam hated playing the dead mother card, with Dean of all people, but it was the only thing he had that made any sense. He swallowed and jerked his head sideways.

"We have a common enemy, Dean," he said, raising his head to gauge Dean's reaction. "The demon killed my mother, too."

Dean's eyes widened and his lips parted; Sam felt bad watching the information pressing all of Dean's buttons, and he hastened to put it in some perspective. "It was years ago. I was just a baby," he explained. "I don't even remember her. If it weren't for old photographs I wouldn't even know what she looked like. But finding the thing that killed her was my grandfather's obsession. I was brought up with it. We all were - my cousins and me. We were raised like warriors: combat training, weapon training, ammunition, melting silver into bullets. We hunted, we fought monsters, we never found the demon, so we killed what we could find, but it was always in the background – the search, trying to trace its movements, figure out its plans – but I realize now even Samuel never had any idea what he was up against."

"Samuel?"

"My grandfather."

"You call your grandfather 'Samuel'?"

"Trust me, he's not the kind of man you call 'Pop'. He runs the family like a guerilla outfit. He's like this patriarch descended from a long line of hunters that came over with the pilgrim fathers, if you believe everything Samuel says."

Dean wore a frown of concentration as he absorbed all that Sam was telling him. "And where was your father in all this?"

"I never knew him. Samuel says he was just some drifter who blew into town, got my mother knocked up and moved on. My grandfather raised me."

Dean tilted his head forward and arched his eyebrows. "You call that being raised? What you just described?"

Sam shrugged. There was a steady flow of water running down his arm now so he tossed the icepack into the sink and wiped his face and arm on his shirt. He tried not to notice the way Dean was looking at him through all this with large, troubled eyes. He had a horrible sense that Dean was feeling sorry for him, and he hated it. Sam wasn't the one deserving sympathy right now.

"I was trying to get out of the life, away from hunting, starting fresh in a new town. That was the plan, anyway." Sam drew a breath in and out in a sharp, heavy sigh. "I was running away, I guess," he admitted. "But there isn't any getting away, not when you know what's out there. I hadn't been in town a month when I started noticing the demon sign, and I knew what it meant." Sam swallowed as he saw Dean's knuckles whiten around his beer bottle. "And maybe you're right, Dean. Maybe I should have said something to you, or your father, but I didn't think it would do any good. And I _tried_, Dean. I tried everything I knew to protect your family. I put protection circles round the house, round your room and your parents' room. It should have worked. It would have done, if it had been any ordinary demon the spells would have kept it out."

Dean's head jerked back. He straightened up and put down his beer. "Are you saying this i_isn't/i_ an ordinary demon?"

Sam drew in a deep breath. Dean already knew the worst; it was only a matter of filling in the rest of the picture, but Sam couldn't help thinking about the old saw, "the devil's in the detail". It had never seemed more apt than it did at that moment. Nevertheless, Sam bit the bullet and started relating the events of Thursday night, from the point where he had pulled Dean out of the flaming room and knocked him unconscious to the moment he had come round on the neighbour's lawn. Sam recounted the demon's revelations and threats, described its strength and power and frankly admitted his own impotence against it and, finally, he described the unprecedented moment when John had broken free of the demon's influence.

"It was only for a few moments, but it was long enough for me to get you out of the house. I don't know how he did it. I've never heard of anyone beating demonic possession before, not even briefly, but your father did it. He saved your life, Dean. He saved both our lives."

Dean was pale. He stood with his arms clasped protectively around his body, and his eyes were wide and frightened. After a beat he reached for his beer but his hand paused short of the bottle. He turned back to Sam. "Do you have any more of that medicinal whisky?" he asked.

Sam nodded and fetched the flask from his backpack, and Dean received it with trembling fingers. He quickly swallowed several mouthfuls and gasped.

"Ok, so how do we find this thing?" he demanded.

Sam's mouth dropped open. Had Dean been listening to anything Sam had told him?

"Dean, you i_don't/i_ find it. Not yet, anyway. Right now my priority is to make sure it doesn't find _you_!"

"Let it find me!" Dean cried. "Bring it on!"

"Dean, listen – "

"No, Sam, i_you/i_ listen! This thing's got Dad! It's driving him around like a cheap rental car, doing . . . God knows i_what/i_! I can't just sit on my ass, I have to help him!"

"Dean, you're no help to your father i_dead/i_!" Sam hadn't meant to shout, and he hadn't meant to be so blunt, but he had to get through to Dean. He'd managed to shut Dean up, briefly, at least. And he had his attention. "Dean, we're talking about a higher level demon here. There is nothing you can do right now."

Dean took another shot of whisky. "Well, what does a fucking higher level demon i_want/i_ with us anyway? Sam, why is this i_happening/i_?"

"I don't know, Dean. I honestly don't know. Your family doesn't even fit the M.O."

"There's an M.O.?"

i_Crap/i_. Sam nodded. "Yes, we've recorded a number of other house fires where a demon was involved. In all the other cases there was a child in the household. Yours is the first case where all the family members were adults."

"Well . . . that's gotta be a clue."

"Of course it is, but I don't know what it means."

"Seems to me you don't know a whole heap, Sam, considering you've had twenty odd years to study this thing."

There was silence. Sam didn't know what to say and they seemed to be at an impasse, but then Dean sighed.

"I'm sorry, Sam. But it's Dad. I can't just . . ." He shook his head and sat down heavily on the bed, and pressed the heel of his hand against his forehead. "What about your family?" he demanded. "Can we go visit them? Maybe your grandfather knows more."

"I know everything he does. I told you, we were all brought up with it."

"But you can't be certain he told you everything – "

"I can't go back there, Dean."

"Sam, could you just put your prodigal grandson issues on the back burner for – "

"_Dean, I can never go home!"_

Dean looked up wide-eyed, and Sam looked away. It was humiliating to see himself reflected there, in honest eyes that were, as yet, untainted by the world that had bred Sam. It seemed that he could never have a conversation with Dean that didn't end with him having either to hide something or admit something shameful.

He sank down on the bed opposite Dean and sat staring at the floor, drawing several breaths before he finally managed to force out a sentence.

"One of my cousins was killed on my watch," he explained. "We were raiding a nest of vampires and . . . and I was distracted; I made errors of judgment, and Gwen was t – she was taken." He could feel the weight of Dean's stare on the top of his head, even if he didn't dare look up at him. "Gwen was Samuel's favourite. She reminded him of my mother. He never forgave me for . . . getting her killed." Sam cleared his throat and looked up without meeting Dean's gaze. "Anyway, suffice to say, my persona isn't exactly grata in the Campbell camp any more. That avenue's closed to us." Sam stood up and leaned against the room partition. In the silence that followed his confession Sam was tempted to pull out the Taurus from the back of his jeans, locate the ticking clock and shoot it. He took a long pull from his beer and wished himself almost any place else. Right about now Dean must be wondering how Sam could ever have had the audacity to expect Dean to put any faith in him.

It was Dean who finally broke the silence with a comment that, at first, seemed apropos of nothing.

"You know Dad's a former marine, don't you?" he said.

Sam turned and looked at him for the first time, wondering where this was going.

"He doesn't talk about it much, but he saw combat. He lost friends, colleagues. I know he lost someone under his command once. Shit happens in battle, Sam." He stood up and walked over to Sam and placed a hand on the partition close to where Sam was leaning. It made Sam uncomfortable. He was standing too close . . . or not close enough. It was disturbing. "Sam, I don't know what went down with your cousin, and I'm not going to presume to tell you how to deal. What would I know? Maybe you never get over something like that. But I do know this . . ." He tilted his head down until his eyes found Sam's and then he lifted Sam's gaze just with the sheer force of his will until they were both standing upright and meeting each other face to face. "Not _everything_ is on you, Sam. What happened to Mom, what's happened to Dad, is not on you. The things I said earlier were bang out of order. You tried to help them. You don't have to beat yourself up because you went fifteen rounds with a demon and lost on points. Even if saving people and hunting things _is_ the family business, putting up with my shit isn't in the job description, and picking up stray civilians and turning them into hunters has gotta be above and beyond. That's not a job. That's proselyting."

Sam shook his head. "I'm just trying to show you how to defend and protect yourself."

"I get that, Sam. But it's not on you. You _don't_ owe me anything. I owe _you_. Ok? You saved my life!"

"That's not what this is about!"

"Then what?"

_Crap_.

Dean waited for an answer and his eyebrows gave a slight hitch of expectation.

_I hate you, Dean Winchester_. "The Righteous Brothers."

"What?"

"Agents Bill Medley and Bobby Hatfield," Sam elaborated. "You and me. We're a team, you said. And I'm not giving up, Dean. _We're_ not giving up. I told you, I want to take this demon down as much as you do. It must have a weakness, vulnerabilities. We're going to keep searching until we find a way to beat it, and save your father. And in the meantime we train, we fight, and we get stronger, so when the time comes . . . we're ready."

Dean's eyes were large and dark as he studied Sam from under the arch of his eyebrows, and suddenly those shining green-brown pools were all Sam could see or think about.

A slow grin spread across Dean's face. "I've got a million of those, you know?" he said.

Sam swallowed and tried to focus. "Yeah?"

"Oh, yeah. There are so many _great_ musicians and rock players."

Sam rolled his eyes. "And I'll bet you know them all," he said, adopting a longsuffering tone.

Dean grinned. "It's a deal then. I'll provide the hot wheels and the cool aliases and you teach me everything you know." He turned to the table and laid his hand on Sam's journal, and then he was suddenly serious. "I want to know it all, Sam, about everything you've written in here: everything you know about every evil thing. I want to learn all there is to learn about hunting. Like you said, I want to be ready."

Sam felt a knot of doubt growing in his gut as he gazed at Dean and saw him glowing with the fire of a man on a mission. Wasn't it what Sam had always intended? To teach Dean how to protect himself, how to survive? But was survival all that mattered? Sam knew what the hunting life did to a person, knew the kind of creature it made of you when blood and death were your nine to five, and a day at the office could include having to gank someone you care about. Would he have to watch as all of Dean's warmth and vitality became mired in darkness and ugliness, as every good impulse and feeling in him was ripped out or buried, and all of his joy and fun turned into a travesty of itself?

To everything there is a season; was Dean supposed to have had his? Sam wondered now if it wouldn't have been kinder after all to let him go up in flames with the rest of his life, if prolonging his time simply meant killing everything about him that made him human, made him Dean.

Well, Sam had a mission of his own, then, and as he gazed at Dean he made a silent vow:

_I promise you now, I will never let that happen._

Dean was waiting for an answer, and Sam nodded. "You got it," he assured him.

"Ok," Dean said. "Well, I'm gonna go and clean up . . . and I'd better make some calls."

"Who to?" Sam was alarmed. Did Dean still not realize that every contact with his past made him vulnerable?

But, apparently, he did. "Sam, I'm starting to realize this isn't an 'I'll just be gone for the weekend, I'll be back Monday morning' kind of gig." He swallowed and cleared his throat as tears began to well in his eyes once more. "I can't expect people to wait around for me while I go off on some epic quest to find my father. I need to say some good-byes."

"Oh." Sam didn't know what to say. "Right."

"Right." Dean cleared his throat again. "And then, could we get out of here? I need to get moving, Sam."

"Right!" Sam agreed. "Absolutely. We should be moving on. I'll start packing up while you're . . . Right."

Dean nodded and disappeared into the bathroom and Sam started gathering up their things. A part of him was actually tempting him to listen at the bathroom door, but he'd be damned if he would stoop that low. Even so, the voice wouldn't let him be.

_That's the end of the girlfriend_, it whispered. i_Clear path, bro._

Sam hated that voice. Dean was severing the last normal, human connection that he had, and a part of Sam was rejoicing over it. What kind of a monster was he?

Then he recalled another voice, that of Saul Whitman:

_He'll turn you into a monster, and then he'll condemn you for it._

Sam shivered. And so he should.

Dean closed his cell phone, ripped off a length of toilet paper, wiped his face and blew his nose. It was probably one of the hardest conversations he'd ever had to have in his life but, now it was over, he was surprised it hadn't been harder. He guessed it diminished by comparison with everything else that was going on. Now it was done, mostly what he felt was relief, and that saddened him. Penny had deserved better than that from him. Well, what did that say other than that Penny deserved better than _him_? She was better off without him.

Dean flushed the toilet paper then went over to the sink, washed his face and brushed his teeth. He caught a glimpse of his reflection in the mirror and grimaced. Not a pretty sight. i_Definitely/i_ better off.

It was a big deal, though. It wasn't just the end of a relationship; it was the end of his old life. No road signs from here on in. He was off the map. Next stop, all points nowhere.

_You'll give up everything you have for him, and then he'll abandon you_.

For a moment Dean was profoundly shaken by the thought. He was i_doing/i_ it. He was giving up everything to go with Sam on this road trip to God knows where, and if Sam deserted him now he'd be boned five ways to Sunday.

Dean shook himself. He was listening to the fucked up thoughts of a dead guy! He was not going to let some screwed up angry spirit lay its issues on him. He had enough of his own to deal with. He dried his hands, gathered all the toiletries together, checked the cupboards then walked out into the main room.

Sam appeared to have packed everything up already and he was outside by the Impala. Dean went round the room checking all the drawers and cupboards one last time. There was a spare carton of salt in the kitchen cabinet. Well, that was just wasteful.

He picked it up and carried it outside. Sam was standing by the trunk. He was just checking his gun back into the weapons cache as Dean walked up.

"You forgot something." Dean held out the salt carton.

Sam smiled grimly, took it and dropped it into the cache then closed the cover. They gazed at each other for a few beats; both seemed to recognize that this was a significant moment. Then Dean reached up to close the trunk.

"Come on," he said. "We've got work to do."

And the trunk closed.

The Call

Hey, tall stranger knocking at my door  
>In the middle of the night, what you want me for?<br>Why d'you walk into my life, knock me to the floor?  
>Tall, dark stranger, what you want me for?<br>Are you an Angel or a Devil calling at my door?

With a fire like hell burning in his eyes  
>He said, "Hey, brother, you'd better get wise.<br>You're life's going nowhere and you don't know why.  
>You'd better get your act together before you die!"<p>

"There's a crossroads coming in your life,  
>And your fate's gonna turn on the point of a knife."<br>He sang "Hey, brother, come away with me.  
>Let me take you, let me show you how it's gotta be."<p>

Hey, tall stranger knocking at my door  
>In the middle of the night, what you want me for?<br>Why d'you walk into my life, knock me to the floor?  
>Tall, dark stranger, what you want me for?<br>Are you an Angel or a Devil calling at my door?

Then the fire came  
>And I felt the flame,<br>Felt a cold chill breath  
>Then his hand on my collar<br>And it felt like death.

In the cold harsh day  
>We drove away.<br>Am I dead or alive?  
>I only know I'm walking at his side.<p>

Hey, tall stranger knocking at my door  
>In the middle of the night, what you want me for?<br>Why d'you walk into my life, knock me to the floor?  
>Tall, dark stranger, what you want me for?<br>Are you an Angel or a Devil calling at my door?

.


	23. Still To Come and Closing Credits

Thank you for reading "I Can Never Go Home", the double pilot episode in the series, "The Song Remains the Same". I hope you are enjoying the road so far. Previews of upcoming episodes can be found in the following chapters, but here is a foretaste of the journey ahead:

.

**STILL TO COME**

Coming up: hints about some of the upcoming episodes in the series (not necessarily in the order shown). If you don't want to know, you should scroll to the closing credits now!

**GOLEM**

While Dean struggles with the grief of his mother's death and his anxieties about his father, Sam and Dean have to do battle with a creature made of mud walking.

**PRANK'D**

Dean is adjusting to his mother's death and his father's disappearance. Sam is adjusting to Dean. While the boys investigate an invisible monster plaguing a reality TV show, Dean hones the skills that will help him survive . . . always assuming Sam doesn't kill him first.

**SOMETHING WICKED?**

A little girl has an imaginary friend who knows too much. When Sam and Dean investigate, Dean is haunted by memories of the little brother he never had.

**DIVA**

Dream come true or worst nightmare? Dean's always wanted to work a case involving strippers . . . he just didn't expect them to be him and Sam.

**WAYWARD SON**

Sam's visions lead him back to Kansas where he is forced to confront the demons of his past, and he learns more than he wants to know about his relationship with Dean.

**AT LEAST WE'RE TALKING**

Sam and Dean find themselves staring down the barrel of the Canon when Balthazar's spell misfires and sends the original Dean and Sam Winchester into their world.

**BAD MOON RISING**

The battle lines are being drawn as Sam and Dean prepare to confront Azazel and rescue John, but are all the demons on the same side?

.

**CLOSING CREDITS**

Since I began writing this series I've received a lot of positive feedback about the soundtrack element of the series and the pop culture references. It has become a tradition on the other sites I post on to include a "closing credits" chapter for the benefit of readers who enjoy spotting all my in-jokes, pop culture references and allusions to other fandoms. Quotes and paraphrases from original SPN episodes are too numerous to list individually. For more information on these, please refer to _Supernatural_ DVDs, seasons one to seven. Most of the allusions in this pilot episode were fairly overt and obvious, and some have already been explained in the actual text, but here are the rest in case there's anyone (other than Sam) who isn't familiar with some of them :)

Please insert your Supernatural soundtrack CD now and click on track 18.

**From the Prologue**

Castor's Passage is a made up town and alludes to the twins from Greek mythology, Castor and Pollux.

**From Scene 3**

"I'm surprised you didn't go the whole nine and say we were Agents Mulder and Skully." – my tribute to the SPN's tribute to the seminal Sci-Fi/Fantasy show, _The X-Files._

"I didn't follow you out here so you could feed me Scooby snacks." – alludes to that other supernatural classic, _Scooby-Doo, Where are you?_

**From Scene 4**

"We're not in Kansas any more." – alludes to SPN's allusions to _The Wizard of Oz._

**From Scene 7**

"How're you doing?"

Funny, but Dean has sometimes reminded me of Joey, from _Friends_. Maybe I'm not the only one because a couple of times in later seasons I noticed Dean using Joey's stock phrase to pick up girls. I had to find an excuse to slip it in even though, in this context, Dean is genuinely asking Sam how he's doing (with his research).

"Who am I? John Edward?" – the celebrity psychic.

**From Scene 8**

"Baa-da baa-da baa-da ba-da-da. Baa-da baa-da ba-daaaaa . . ." he sang as he dropped the spoke Sam had given him into his lap and slid the keys into the ignition. He turned a grin toward Sam and tossed him a quick hitch of the eyebrows. "I ain't afraid of no ghost!" – Well, I had to get in a _GhostbustersI _reference, now, didn't I? :)

"Cue bloody climax and Thelma and Louise finale." – at the conclusion of the movie of the same name, the two friends drive off a cliff into the Grand Canyon. Jensen and Jared have been known to suggest that this might be an appropriate conclusion to the last ever episode of _Supernatural._

**From Scene 9**

"How about _Lethal Weapon 3_ – no, on second thoughts, let's not go there." In this movie, Mel Gibson and René Russo start comparing scars and the scene almost winds up R-rated.

"You're seriously telling me that _vampires_ exist?"

Sam closed the book and returned it to his backpack. "They do. But they don't glitter, and they don't date cheerleaders." – Some might consider it sacrilegious that I've included allusions to _Twilight_ and _Buffy the Vampire Slayer_ in the same sentence . . .

"Let's go kick Casper squared into the light." – alludes to the cartoon character, Casper the Friendly Ghost.

**From Scene 10**

"Any sign of Frank and Jessie, yet?" – Yep, that's the James Brothers.

The sooner it was done the less opportunity the Gruesome Twosome would have to bother him and Sam. – alludes to cartoon characters from the show, _The Whacky Races._

_._

**MUSIC CREDITS**

AC/DC "Highway to Hell"

Eagles "Heartache Tonight"

Dean Winchester "The Call"

**Disclaimer: **My thanks and apologies for all of the above and especially to the creators, writers and producers of _Supernatural. _I own nothing your recognize, and I write for love only.


	24. Preview of Episode 2

The following preview is the opening of episode 2 in the series "The Song Remains the Same". The story continues in a separately posted fic entitled "Golem"

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS: The inspiration for this episode, much of the imagery of the opening scene, and also some of the mechanical details with respect to the golem, I owe to the X-Files episode "Kaddish". I, of course, do not own the X-Files or any parts thereof any more than I own Supernatural or any parts thereof (though I'm prepared to pay good money for any parts of Sam and Dean that I can get my hands on). As always, I offer my apologies to the writers and creators of both Supernatural and the X-Files for my use and abuse of their original material.

THE ROAD SO FAR:

Amanda Winchester is dead and John is possessed by the yellow-eyed demon. Their son Dean has dropped out of college, abandoned his old life, and taken to the road with the mysterious hunter, Sam Campbell. Sam is teaching Dean about the supernatural and, together, they have embarked on a quest to find and rescue John, and avenge the deaths of their mothers. But Sam is harbouring secrets: about his dark past, about his strange prophetic visions, and about his struggle against his powerful attraction to Dean.

NOW

_Slough , Colorado_

It had been raining earlier, but now the night was clear. The air was still and a heavy mist clung to the ground in the dark corners of the cemetery, while the grave itself was bathed in cold moonlight. It illuminated the dead leaves that lay sodden in the grass, and the newly dug earth was moist and glistening. It made it easy to work, shape, mould, and soon the rough clods began to take on form: first an oval the size of a human head, then an oblong barrel representing the torso; arms grew out from the trunk, legs, feet. Eventually a fully fashioned human figure lay stretched out over the grave, like the first lump of primordial clay, waiting to receive the spark of life.

The work done, the creator retreated into the shadows and was gone. Time passed. Clouds gathered once more and hid the face of the moon as the earthen chest began to rise and fall, and the creature took its first breath in darkness.


	25. Preview of Episode 3

AUTHOR'S NOTES: This is a preview of episode 3 in the series "The Song Remains the Same". The story continues in a separately posted story entitled "Prank'd"

**THE ROAD SO FAR:**

_Amanda Winchester is dead and John is possessed by the yellow-eyed demon. Their son Dean has dropped out of college, abandoned his old life, and taken to the road with the mysterious hunter, Sam Campbell. Sam is teaching Dean about the supernatural and, together, they have embarked on a quest to find and rescue John, and avenge the deaths of their mothers._

**NOW**

_Upper Creek, Texas._

As he descended the stairs his torchlight fell on an assortment of jars arranged on the dust laden, cob-webbed shelves that lined the room. His expression reflected a sense of morbid fascination with their brackish contents and the nameless shapes festering within.

"We should leave," urged his athletic, blonde companion. "Trust me. No good can come of this," she insisted. "I've faced this thing before. Once it sees you, it never lets go."

As he turned, the light from her torch picked out the sweep of his dark hair and accentuated the determined cut of his jaw, the glitter of his darkly intense eyes. His voice was deep and gruff as he told her "I'm not leaving. We have to find my brother."

He moved cautiously into the depths of the dank cellar and began to revolve slowly while training the torch beam around the room. As he completed his circuit the beam rested once more on the face of his companion. He noted her slack jaw and wide-eyed shock at the same instant that he felt something cold brush against the back of his neck. Hesitantly he turned and raised fearful eyes upward, toward the body hanging from the rafter above him, its head twisted at an unnatural and grotesque angle, purple swollen tongue lolling in a face frozen into a gruesome death-masque. Then, opening his mouth to yell, he emitted a long, high-pitched girly wail.

There was a moment of stunned silence before he and his co-star caught each other's eyes and both erupted into a fit of helpless giggling.

"Cut!" yelled the director.

"Sasha! What was that?" Sarah demanded, recovering slightly as she wiped tears of laughter from her eyes.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" he gasped. He chewed at the insides of his cheeks, trying to regain composure, but it was no use. He was gone.

The sight of Fran Spires heading his way sobered him a little. He wouldn't say he was afraid of the writer/director of Grudge Holder II, but she was influential in her own sphere. It was rumored she could get anyone in Hollywood into her flicks and have them do anything she wanted. And Sasha didn't want to open a script and find _himself _hanging from a rafter in the next scene.

"That's great, Sasha. It's all good," she assured him. "Love your work." She paused. "We'll go again. And this time, do you think you can make the scream a little more . . . um . . . macho? I mean, I know it's your brother but . . ."

"I know. I know. I'm sorry. I think maybe I'm a bit . . ." he grimaced ". . . off balance . . . you know, after this morning?" She couldn't blame him for that. She'd approved it. Of course, that didn't necessarily mean she approved _of_ it. "I'll find it," he promised.

Fran nodded. "I know you will, angel."

"Going again, everybody!" yelled a set worker. "Ten-minute reload for camera and sound!"

Sarah had wandered off to get a drink so Sasha decided to take a little walk to settle himself. Pulling out his cell phone he started to compose a message. "Ciao, sashamores!" he tweeted. "Still not recovered from my brush with the prank'd team. Those guys got me good. Plotting my revenge on the tall guy! Rotflmao!"

Sasha's attention was suddenly arrested by a horrendous rending and crashing noise coming from behind the cabin. As he moved toward the back of the set he witnessed trees and scenery being hurled hither and thither, seemingly by some invisible source. It was an impressive sight, and he wondered how it was being achieved without the benefit of C.G.I. He also wondered why he hadn't been informed an FX scene was being filmed today. Perhaps the new guy had slipped up. He shrugged and turned away from the commotion, but hadn't moved more than a few feet when he started to notice a whole bunch of NC17 shiz-nickel: swathes of red splashed across the set or glistening in wet pools, severed limbs with ragged, bloody ends. The techies on this movie really knew their stuff; he'd never seen such realistic work. As he stepped back to avoid compromising the scene he felt something warm and wet drip onto his head and trickle over his ear. He wiped it off and stared at the red stain on his fingers.

_Warm?_

It was then that he noticed the growing stench: rich, pervasive and visceral. He looked up. Hanging from a lighting rig above him was what remained of a man Sasha vaguely recognized as a member of the _Prank'd_ team: a bloody head hanging broken and twisted over a limbless torso that swayed gently backwards and forwards trailing streamers of intestine.

Sasha vented a hoarse and guttural scream of horror. Inappropriately, it occurred to him that Fran would have been pleased with it. Unable to move, he was rocking slightly with a sense of disconnection and unreality. He was half conscious of people running up behind and beside him, and presently he recognized the two nearest him as the new P.A. and his tall friend. The young man traded glances with his friend.

"Son of a bitch!" he snarled.

_This story continues as a separately posted story entitled "Prank'd"_


	26. Preview of Episode 4

**AUTHOR'S NOTES: This is a preview of episode 4 in the series "The Song Remains the Same". The story continues in a separately posted story entitled "Together"**

**THE ROAD SO FAR:**

_After leading a hunting raid that results in the death of his cousin, Sam Campbell is estranged from his hunter family and tries to escape the life. He attempts to start afresh in a new town and is employed as a mechanic by John Winchester, but a death vision of John's wife and son under horribly familiar circumstances draws him back into the world of the supernatural. When the yellow eyed demon possesses John and murders Amanda, Sam carries their son Dean from their burning home. Now Dean has abandoned his old life as a college student and would be musician, and Sam is teaching him about hunting as they pursue their quest to find and rescue John, and avenge the deaths of their mothers. Tensions have been mounting as the friends struggle with their personal fears and self doubts, and as they adjust to each other's idiosyncrasies. Sam has been concealing secrets about his past and about his psychic abilities. Dean has recently discovered that Sam is attracted to him and is beginning to examine his own feelings._

**NOW**

_In the heartland_

It was the slowest day of the year: not a customer all afternoon until four o'clock when a tall, swarthy, solidly built man walked into the empty bar and rolled up to the counter. Unloading a duffel bag from his shoulders and resting it on the stool beside him he locked the bar-keeper with dark, intense eyes and a broad smile.

"Give me a shot of Jack, friend," he said. "And take one yourself. I'm celebrating."

"Thank you, sir, and congratulations," the barman replied as he poured the drinks. "May I ask what the occasion is?"

The man picked up his shot and knocked it back whole, setting the empty glass back on the bar with a satisfied sigh. "Do you have children?" he asked.

"Two sons and a daughter," the barman acknowledged.

"Good. Then you'll know how it is – how you bring them into the world, you raise them, try to protect them and guide them . . . then a day comes when you can see the progress they've made, and you see them taking their first steps toward their destiny, and if you know you've had a hand in that, you'll know what a proud moment it is for a father."

The barman nodded his understanding. "Sure is," he agreed.

The dark man pushed his glass across the bar. "Hit me again," he said, and the barman refilled the glass. "Do you believe in destiny?" he asked.

"Can't say I've thought about it, sir."

"Oh, I'm a great believer. I believe life is like a story – like the great stories that are told over and over again, and everyone tells them a different way, but some parts are fixed. The hero always meets the temptress; partnerships are always tested; the big choices are made. That's destiny. The story's always the same. It's just the how and the why that changes." He leaned forward and grinned, and suddenly his eyes glowed yellow. "The Devil's in the detail."

The barman gasped and stumbled backwards but the man's hand shot out and grabbed him by the collar, dragging him across the bar and pressing their faces close together.

"Not so fast, friend. I have to make a call to my daughter."

"There – there's a p – payphone next to the – "

The thing with the yellow eyes raised its other hand and the barman saw the glint of the knife there before it sliced cold across his throat.

"It's not that kind of call." The demon lifted the chalice from his duffel bag and held it under the barman's head as he bled out.

Azazel grinned. "I can feel you in there, John, scratching, fighting. Gotta say I'm impressed. Most people would have given up by now, but not you. You never stop. You never give in. You just gotta keep fighting the good fight. That's what I like about you, John." The demon stirred a finger in the hot, crimson fluid. "It's in your blood."

**The story continues in a separately posted story entitled "Together"**


	27. Preview of Episode 5

**The following is a preview of Episode 5. The story continues in a separately posted story entitled "Something Wicked?"  
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***** A SPECIAL APOLOGY TO MY REGULAR READERS *****

I'm so sorry for the great gap in time that has passed since I last posted an update to this series. I'd like to assure you that this has not been due to any loss of enthusiasm on my part for the story or the project, but to a specific work commitment that has prevented me from devoting my attention to my writing. That commitment has now been dispatched and normal service will be resumed from now on. I thank you from the bottom of my heart for your patience, your loyalty, and your continuing support.

**.**

**EPISODE 5: SOMETHING WICKED?**

**THE ROAD SO FAR:**

_After leading a hunting raid that leads to the death of his cousin, Sam Campbell is estranged from his hunter family and tries to escape the life. He attempts to start afresh in a new town and is employed by John Winchester, but a death vision of John's wife and son under horribly familiar circumstances draws him back into the world of the supernatural. When the yellow eyed demon possesses John and murders Amanda, Sam rescues their son Dean and teaches him about hunting. Dean abandons his old life as a college student and would be musician and, together, he and Sam embark on a quest to find and rescue John, and avenge the deaths of their mothers. _

_In the wake of an explosive quarrel the friends are re-examining the nature of their relationship. Dean is coaxing Sam to address his intimacy issues, but Sam still has doubts and he is concealing secrets about his past and about his psychic abilities. Meanwhile the demons Meg and Ruby have appeared in disguise to Sam and Dean, and Dean has received help from a mysterious blue-eyed stranger._

_**Prologue**_

_**Lichtburg, Wisconsin.**_

He couldn't even say what it was about the boy that fascinated him so much. He wasn't a particularly exceptional or attractive child. He was much like any of the other neighbourhood kids, small for his age perhaps, with dirty blond hair and pudgy cheeks and eyes that were somehow too big for his face, and there was something ungainly about the way he walked as he followed after the girl. He was always with that girl. That meant there were fewer opportunities to get him by himself, of course, but it stirred a kind of resentment for other reasons. There was something about the way the boy looked at her, like the sun shone for her, that was both compelling and discomfiting . . . because it was something that was beyond _his_ experience . . . Maybe that had something to do with it.

Of course they were all memorable, in their way, but Donald Helfer especially so, because he was the first. First times are always special.

Suzy had a big empty biscuit tin she'd saved from Christmas. She bought a post card and wrote a message to the future, and for good measure she put a stamp on it. And she added the whole of the rest of her pocket money for that week: twenty three cents. There was a picture of her favourite pop group, too. Donald was a little jealous of those brothers because Suzy went on and on about them, but he didn't really mind because he knew they lived hundreds of miles away, in Utah, and he lived right next door to Suzy.

She was too old for him, he knew that – because he was only nine and a half, and she was nearly eleven – but Donald thought she was the prettiest girl he'd even seen. She had hair the colour of caramel fudge, and it flowed down the sides of her face in waves and ringlets and smelled of apples; and her eyes were the brightest, clearest blue – the colour of his favourite marble. And she was his best friend in the whole wide world. She didn't tease him because he was short and awkward and a bit bandy. She didn't mind that he had freckles. And he didn't mind too much that she called him Donny.

Donny put his marbles in the tin along with one of his old comics, and they both cut off a piece of their hair and put that in as well. Then they spent the rest of the afternoon taping songs from the radio onto a C60 with the cassette recorder Suzy'd been given for her birthday. Afterward Suzy went to fetch that day's newspaper: Thursday April 29th 1976.

While she was out of the room Donny rewound the tape a little way. He leaned real close to the microphone and whispered "Suzy Wayte, I'll love you forever and ever," then he hastily took out the cassette, slipped it into its case and dropped it into the tin. He was startled and a little alarmed when Suzy returned and took it out again, but she was just wrapping everything in the newspaper, and then she carefully covered the paper in Saran Wrap before placing it in the tin.

Donny dug the hole – under the tree in his back yard. It was hard work and it made him sweat, and the shovel gave him blisters but he didn't tell Suzy that. After they'd put the tin in the bottom they pushed the cool, damp earth back into the hole, patted it down with their hands and covered it over with grass clippings. They promised each other that this would always be their special secret, and they would come back to this spot on the same day in thirty years and retrieve their time capsule together. They sealed it with a pinkie swear.

Donald Helfer was nine and a half years old when he was murdered on Friday April 30th 1976.

**The story continues in a separately posted story entitled "Something Wicked?"**

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	28. A Preview of Episode 6

**The following is a preview of episode 6. The story continues in a separately posted story entitled "Bad Blood".**

**.**

**EPISODE 6: BAD BLOOD**

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**_THE ROAD SO FAR:_**

_After leading a hunting raid that leads to the death of his cousin, Sam Campbell is estranged from his hunter family and tries to escape the life. He attempts to start afresh in a new town and is employed by John Winchester, but a death vision of John's wife and son under horribly familiar circumstances draws him back into the world of the supernatural. When the yellow eyed demon possesses John and murders his wife, Amanda, Sam rescues their son Dean and teaches him about hunting. Dean abandons his old life as a college student and would be musician and, together, he and Sam embark on a quest to find and rescue John, and avenge the deaths of their mothers. _

_The friends have tentatively embarked on a sexual relationship. Dean is coaxing Sam to address his intimacy issues and they have been growing closer. Sam is considering telling Dean about his psychic abilities. Meanwhile a clue about the Colt from the demon Gemma (Ruby in disguise) has led them to Red Lodge._

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**Prologue**

**_Sunrise, Wyoming. May 1st 1856._**

There was no sound at first but for the wind in the trees and the song of birds. At first. Then came the distant rumble of hooves, drawing nearer, growing louder, until the horse thundered along the dirt track and drew up sharply in the clearing outside the old timber shack. The rider, a fair haired man with a young face and old eyes, swung free of the saddle and dropped to the ground, spurs rattling as his boots hit the dirt, the tails of his long coat swaying around his shins. He didn't bother to tether the horse to the hitching rail, just let it wander freely up the track; he knew it wouldn't roam far. Pausing to light a cheroot he inhaled deeply, lips twisting into a sardonic smirk as he surveyed his environment

"Home sweet home?" he challenged, betraying traces of a deep southern drawl, as he let himself into the cabin.

The weathered old hunter barely glanced up from the volume where he was scribbling in a rapid sloping hand. "For now," he confirmed, gruffly.

"You're a long way from Connecticut," the young man observed. "I heard you were building a railroad. Not enough profit in arms dealing, then?" There was no response except the scratching of the pen so he continued in a more serious tone. "Your devil's trap won't stop it, Colt. There's only one thing that will. Do you have it or not?"

The hunter finally raised his head. Tossing back his jacket he revealed the gun holstered at his hip. "You have to catch him first," he pointed out.

"Oh, I'll find him," the visitor drawled, low and silky. "But will it get the job done?"

A humorless smile touched the corners of Colt's lips as he drew the gun out of the holster and handed it to the fair haired man. "This gun will kill anything that walks on God's green earth," he assured him.

"The Beast, too?"

The confidence withered from Colt's expression, but he nodded nevertheless. "It'll kill the Demon and his spawn if it comes to that," he said. "Better it doesn't."

The visitor examined the weapon. It was a thing of beauty, a precision instrument in every detail. The inky black metal was ornately decorated, there was a pentacle branded into the polished walnut grip, and the barrel bore the legend "non timebo mala". There were 5 bullets loaded in the cylinder.

"The rest are in there." Colt indicated a box on the desk. "Don't waste 'em. The gun's useless once they're gone." He watched the other man place the gun in its box and close the lid, but as he moved to pick it up Colt held it with a restraining hand. "I'm trusting you with a fearful weapon," he said. "It isn't to be used indiscriminately."

The other man smirked. "Growing morals in your old age, Colt?" he asked.

"I'm thinking of the children," Colt persisted. "They're not the monsters. They're just innocent victims."

The visitor raised his gaze from the box. His knowing eyes held Colt's, and his lips peeled back in a rueful grin that revealed the sharp points of his second set of teeth. "So were we all," he commented, "once upon a time."

Colt absorbed the point then nodded grimly. "Once upon a time," he agreed.

.

**The story continues in a separately posted story entitled "Bad Blood".**


End file.
